Benedict made a strangled sound and put his face in his hands. His body was wracked by dry sobs as behind his eyes he saw again the look on Gisele's face as the arrow pierced her heart and brought her down like a doe. Mauger looked on, his expression appalled and embarrassed. Julitta said nothing, just held Benedict, trying to convey sympathy and grief by touch. She could understand why he had shied from the subject on the wharf.
'It is good that he weeps,' said Sancho, the least perturbed of anyone in the room. 'It cleans the wound of poison, makes it easier to heal. I have been concerned about him.'
Julitta raised her eyes to Sancho's. Behind the prickly facade lay compassion and care. 'What happened to him?' she asked.
Briefly Sancho told her the entire story as he had heard it from Faisal, not once glancing at Mauger, as if he felt the other man should not be present.
'I would have gladly died too,' Benedict muttered through the bars of his fingers.
'Not gladly, son,' Sancho reproached. 'If you had truly desired to yield up your soul to God, you would not have fought so hard to live when Faisal was tending you. It is the self-pity in you speaking, not the man.'
Benedict raised his head and stared at Sancho with narrowed eyes. Sancho returned the look, unperturbed. Benedict wiped his eyes on the heel of his hand and pushing himself out of Julitta's embrace, rose and walked to the window embrasure to stare out on Clothilde's sun-filled vegetable garden.
'So what are you doing in Bordeaux?' Mauger demanded, an edge of resentment and suspicion in his voice.
Benedict's left shoulder rose and fell. 'Returning to Brize with my burden of tidings and a cargo of Spanish horses.' His tone was weary now, uncaring. 'I hear that you are seeking a war stallion for Duke Robert.'
Mauger drank off his wine and refilled his cup. 'What of it?'
Julitta glanced at her husband. It occurred to her that with Gisele dead, Benedict was no longer the automatic heir to Brize-sur-Risle, that Mauger was the one with the better claim through herself. She wondered if Mauger had realised it too.
Benedict shrugged again and did not look round. 'Nothing,' he said dully. 'Congratulations.'
'Lord Robert specifically requested that I be sent,' Mauger added defensively.
'I am sure you are capable of selecting the kind of horse the Duke requires.'
'I am,' Mauger said tightly. 'And I have. So don't you go parading your own fancy Spanish wares beneath his nose when we return.'
'Christ, Mauger, do you think I care at the moment?' Benedict demanded in a voice that still cracked with the raw emotion of grief. 'I don't give a split rivet for your petty schemes!' He made an abrupt throwing gesture with his clenched fist. 'I think we have nothing more to say to each other that will not end in a fight.' He strode from the room without looking at its other occupants, not even Julitta.
Mauger drank down the wine. 'Don't look at me,' he growled. 'It's not my fault.'
Julitta gave him a disgusted glare. 'I know that you would prefer him to have died,' she said, and rising to her feet, followed Benedict out.
Sancho stepped into the breach as Mauger made to stride in pursuit of his wife. 'Stay,' he commanded, his cracked voice suddenly imperative. 'You will only goad him into a corner, or he will goad you, and there will be bloodshed. Let the woman handle him.'
Mauger glowered, but Sancho glowered back far more effectively, and held his ground. 'You say you are capable of selecting bloodstock for your Duke? Come then, tell me what you know, and see if your talent matches up to mine.' He gestured to the bench that Julitta had vacated. 'Sit, cease drinking and eat some of that bread to soak up all the wine you've consumed. I don't suffer fools gladly.'
'Why should I listen to you?'
'Because mine is the voice of reason.' The little overseer drew a fresh liquorice twig from his pouch, poked it in the side of his mouth where two teeth still opposed each other in the gum, and started to chew.
Mauger continued to scowl, but he made no attempt to thrust Sancho out of the way, and in a moment, he sat down and reached to the bread basket. 'I've been in this trade since the cradle. I don't need lessons from you.'
Sancho sat down beside him and stretched out his legs, easing their stiffness. 'I too was taught from the cradle and this year I will see out seventy winters. And still I find much to learn. A man who says he knows everything, knows nothing.'
Once out of the house, Julitta hitched her skirts to her shins and ran to catch up with Benedict who was striding out as if the devil were at his heels.
'Wait!' she gasped out. 'Ben, please wait!' 'Leave me alone!' he snarled raggedly over his shoulder. Julitta redoubled her efforts to reach him, and catching him by the arm, swung him round to face her. 'I won't impose on you beyond a moment,' she panted, 'but there is something that you must see. I know that you don't want my company or Mauger's — we're only salt in your wound, but…' Her voice trembled and she broke off.
His eyes had been opaque, a little mad, but now they cleared and he focused on her, breathing hard. 'I should have known that I could not run from you,' he said and squared his shoulders. 'What is it you want of me?'
What I cannot have, she thought. 'I want to give you something. Come.' She tugged at his sleeve, drawing him back toward the house and the stable shed beyond the courtyard. 'Here.' She drew him into the first stall.
He stared at the two horses, the grey gelding and the small chestnut mare. The grey swung his intelligent head and absorbed the scent and sight of the man. A sound, somewhere between a nicker and a grunt, rippled from the gelding's nostrils, and he tugged at his halter, eager to reach Benedict. The mare, too, pricked up her ears and whickered softly.
'Cylu?' Benedict whispered. He went to the grey and laid his hand against the glossy, muscular neck. Cylu nudged him lovingly with his nose. Benedict inspected the horse, turning disbelief into reality as he felt the solidity of bone and muscle, the satin hide, the warm, sweet breath. 'Where did you find them?' His attention flickered briefly to the mare, to Julitta, then back to grey gelding. A part of him was restored, and although it was only a small part, by its very presence it assumed great importance. A straw upon which to cling, a foundation on which to rebuild.
We bought them from a coper here in Bordeaux,' Julitta said, watching him with a mingling of love and pain. 'He said that he obtained them from a Basque trader.'
Benedict laughed harshly. 'A Basque cut-throat more likely. I wonder how many other pilgrims' horses have been sold that way?' He pressed his palm against Cylu's warm, dappled neck. 'I saw her die,' he muttered. 'Mercifully it was quick, she knew nothing beyond the first moment, but her eyes were on me as she fell. There was nothing I could do… nothing.' His voice quivered and his fingers tightened in Cylu's mane. If they had not, he would have turned round and engulfed Julitta in his grief and anger, and he knew that he dared not. A step too far on the crumbling edge of a precipice. Behind him, she was silent, as if she too sensed the danger of the moment. Then he heard the straw rustle. When he dared to look round, he discovered that he was alone.
He took time to compose himself, washed his hands and face in the water pail and went outside. She was sitting on a bench in the shade of the stable wall, her skirts tucked beneath her. He went to her and sat down, keeping a body's distance between them.
'I am sorry,' he said wryly.
'You needed a moment to be alone – and so did I.' She looked at him, and then down at her hands.
Benedict watched her toy with her gold wedding ring. 'Was Mauger so jealous of you that he had to bring you all the way to Bordeaux?'
'In a way. Robert of Normandy decided that I was the perfect dish to refresh his jaded palate. He wanted Mauger out of the way, so sent him down here to buy an Iberian warhorse. Mauger saw straight through his ploy and made me accompany him – not that I was unwilling. Robert of Normandy is no safe harbour for a runaway wife, and besides, I enjoy the freedom of travelling. Of course,' she added to the gold ring, 'instead of Robert of Normandy, Mauger now has you to contend with.'