Benedict sighed. 'You and he, I thought you had found contentment?' he said, remembering that time he had walked in on them making love on the solar floor.
'Resignation,' she murmured and darted him a glance. 'I have tried to adapt to Mauger's ways, he tries to compromise, but the road is strewn with thorns.'
Benedict thought about Sancho, about the tale the old man had told him of his youthful elopement. 'It was hard for her,' he had said. 'We never really had any peace.' He leaned his head against the stable wall and looked at her. 'When I have spoken to your father and delivered the horses, I am returning to Castile.'
'For always?' Dismay widened her eyes and she caught her full underlip in her teeth, a mannerism that had always maddened and enchanted him.
'For the next few years at least. Sancho will more than welcome me. If I return to England, it will only be to face the persecution of William Rufus. I know between him, Robert of Normandy, and Rodrigo Diaz of Bivar, which lord I would rather serve.'
'But what of my father?' Julitta protested with indignation. 'I can understand that you feel no loyalty to Rufus and Robert, neither of them are worth a spit in the wind, but surely you owe my father more than that?'
Benedict met her gaze which was fierce-blue with anger. 'I owe your father more than I can ever repay, most of it in regrets and apologies,' he said bleakly. 'I will do my best to make reparations in Spanish horse stock and silver. You do not need to tell me that it is not enough.'
She said nothing, just continued to stare at him, and he plunged on, further justifying his decision in the face of her silence. 'You are now your father's heir, and through you, Mauger. You may say that I am cutting off my nose to spite my face, but I could not bear to take orders from him at Brize and Ulverton. I have made friends in Castile and the beginnings of a new life. The threads of my old one are too tangled and broken to be mended.'
Julitta reddened, and compressing her lips looked the other way for a moment.
'Julitta?' He leaned toward her.
She shook her head and swallowed valiantly. 'You are right,' she said. 'A life in Castile will suit you, and my father too, since he will have a source of fine-bred Iberian horses at the flick of his finger. He can always find another overseer for Ulverton. It is just that I…' She broke off and angrily wiped her eyes. 'It is foolish.' Her voice quivered. 'I have loved you since I was five years old. You would think I would know better by now.' She sprang to her feet before he could close the gap between them. 'No, let me be,' she warned. 'I am overjoyed to know you are alive, let that be enough.'
Benedict rose too, not knowing what he was going to do or say, only aware that they could not part like this. There had to be a better balance. 'Julitta, listen,' he pleaded, but whatever he would have said went unspoken as two grooms entered Clothilde's courtyard, leading a plunging black stallion, its eyes white-rimmed and its upper lip wrinkled back to show vicious yellow teeth. Its mane and tail in contrast to its coat, were a bright silver.
Open-mouthed, Benedict stared. 'Christ on the Cross,' he said softly. 'Don't tell me that Mauger's gone and bought that brute.'
'What do you mean?' Julitta demanded sharply, a note of fear in her voice.
'Sancho and I saw that black earlier. He'd just kicked one of his handlers in the thigh and nigh on cracked the bone. Fine colour, fine looks, but I doubt that any man will come close enough to mount him, let alone stay in the saddle. He's not just wild, he's savage.'
Julitta shook her head. 'Mauger would never buy an animal like that. You know how cautious he is.'
'Cautious or not, it's been brought here, and it's certainly neither for me, nor Sancho.' He started forward to help the grooms, but Mauger and Sancho emerged from the house, and Benedict halted.
'Where shall we put him, lord?' enquired one of the attendants between grunts for breath as he strove to hold the horse.
Mauger indicated Clothilde's small stable. 'Bring out the chestnut and the grey, and put him in their place,' he commanded.
'He'll kick the place to bits,' Benedict said, appalled.
Mauger strode up to his grooms. 'Mind your own business, I know what I'm buying.'
'An early grave by the looks of things,' Sancho declared with a curl to his upper lip. He watched the black stallion rear and buck, plunge and kick. 'Still, you do not need lessons from me,' he gave an exaggerated shrug, 'or so you say.'
'Mauger,' Benedict entreated, his hand outstretched. 'Don't be a fool. Swallow your pride.'
'Pride has nothing to do with it,' Mauger said through his teeth. It was obvious that rather than swallow he would choke. 'Take your horses and go!'
Benedict contained his anger, although it flashed in his eyes, and tightened his mouth comers. 'And so I will,' he said quietly, accepting the lead reins of Cylu and the mare from a groom. 'We have nothing more to say to each other, at least not without bloodshed.' He looked at Julitta. 'Go with God,' he murmured. 'You will be in my thoughts.'
'And you in mine.' Her lower lip quivered.
'Leave Julitta alone,' Mauger hissed. 'She is my wife, you lost yours.'
Benedict flinched from the fury in Mauger's bright grey eyes. He seemed almost as mad as the black stallion. 'Yes, she is your wife,' he answered. 'You ram it down my throat at every opportunity.'
'Lest you forget!' Mauger snarled.
It was too much. Benedict's resolve broke. 'How could I?' he attacked. 'We both know why she was married to you in the first place!'
The air between them was drenched with more than just the heat of the day. Mauger's right hand eased towards the hilt of his sword. Benedict was not wearing a blade, had only his meat knife at his belt. He wanted to seize it and plunge it into Mauger's arrogant body, but by a supreme effort of will, he clenched his fists and kept them down at his sides. 'This is foolish,' he said impatiently. 'There can be no winner from this.'
He mounted Cylu, held out the chestnut's rope for Sancho, and rode out of the courtyard. Although he did not look round, he could feel the stares striking his spine – Mauger's hatred, Julitta's love and anguish.
The sides of the horse shelter shook as the black stallion kicked and kicked again, the hollow drumming filling the world.
'He thinks he is better than everyone when he is nothing,' Sancho said contemptuously. And then he grinned, revealing the interior of his juice-blackened mouth. 'Your woman, she is very beautiful. Never have I seen such pretty hair.'
Benedict thought about murdering the little overseer. 'She is not my woman.'
'You think because I am old and I squint that I have no eyes?' Sancho snapped his fingers in front of Benedict's face.
'I think that because you are old and you squint, you should mind your own business.'
Sancho snorted. 'You are my business, lad.'
'Then leave me alone.' Benedict kicked his heels against Cylu's flanks and urged him to a trot, putting distance between himself and Sancho's gargoyle grin. But the overseer's words followed him, and so did the eyes, with their knowing squint.
CHAPTER 59
The September sea was a calm green-blue with the gentlest of swells as the Constantine sailed up the tidal estuary of the Garonne and entered the wide bite of the Bay of Biscay. White caps rolled shorewards and gulls soared above the slow wake of the galley, their cries piercing in the clear air.