The stone ball sailed through the air. It hit the castle’s outer wall. The barely visible chip in the facing of the wall might have enlarged marginally. Or not – Trempwick couldn’t tell. His hand shaded his eyes from the sun. It did nothing for aiding detail over the long distance.
The trebuchet crew started to haul the throwing arm back down.
The second trebuchet launched its missile. The result was the same.
Chester castle was strong. One of the keys to the border and the seat of the Earl of Chester. The Earl was in residence. Letting his hand drop Trempwick made his decision.
Chip, chip, chip away. The castle would fall. Eventually. After a boring siege where his talents would be wasted. The bastard’s forces were severely weakened along the Marches. It would be time before – if – reinforcements could be sent them. The Welsh could handle this.
Nothing yet from Nell. He wondered if he would get a reply. Surmised possibly not. Not a written one, not a spoken one. Too many days had passed. He worried for her. His reply would come in deeds? He had spilled out his heart in a way he rarely did. He deserved some reply.
He would return to London. Make sure all was right there. Then
do something.
When he entered the common room one of the English men at arms, seated facing the door, rapped his mug on the table and pointed. Heads turned, bodies shifted. Then faces broke into welcoming smiles. Two men seated at the high end of the long trestle table came to their feet so quickly that they knocked into each other; they retreated a couple of steps backwards, both offering their stools to Fulk with a light bow.
Fulk accepted the rightmost seat, conscious of the triumphant look the man whose place he’d taken gave the other as they went to find new places on one of the long benches. A drink was poured and handed up the table, placed in easy reach with a murmured, “My lord.” He drank, hiding his shock behind the earthenware rim. It grew, and every tiny growth never failed to surprise him. From welcomed as a man amongst men when the first men were recruited in England to … this, some sort of celebrity. More than that – he was respected.
Alfred asked, “Do we stay or leave, my lord?”
Fulk drained his cup before answering. “We stay. For now.”
Luke leaned forward. “So he’s finally put forth a decent offer?”
“I couldn’t say. But we’re staying, for now.”
At the middle of the higher end of the table Waltheof steepled his hands. “It was good to see someone stand up to the Nefastus, my lord.” The Scottish knight’s mouth hardened. “There is a bright point to my situation – I’ll perhaps not have to pledge fealty to him.” Waltheof was originally the second son of his family, sent to train for the clergy at seven and home again at twelve to train as a knight and heir, a change of career granted by his elder brother’s death. Then his father had died, his mother remarried; the lands had been held in jointure, Waltheof would only inherit when his mother also died. A new brother appeared in due course, and the stepfather had done his all to make his own son the heir. Waltheof had been thrown out with horse and armour the day after he was dubbed, that being done as soon as could be managed with decorousness. When his mother died he would have to appeal to royal justice for his lands, or return home with an army and chase his half-brother out. There was no certainty to either approach.
Someone barked with laughter. “The little runt fair near soiled himself!”
The room laughed or grinned, excepting Fulk.
Luke jumped up, hunched down to half his height and shook a fist up at an imaginary person. “Damn you! I’ll crush you! I’ll break you with my bare hands!” He hopped up and down a few times, miming trying to strangle someone far taller then he. “Damn you!”
The corner of Fulk’s mouth lifted. “It wasn’t that bad.”
Luke hopped once more, then stood up properly. “My lord, you didn’t see it.”
“Besides, the lad’s of good height for his years.”
Waltheof mused, “In truth that is so, and you are of no more than average height and build. Still, isn’t it said that a man’s stature comes from many things? And in the contrast between callow youth and experienced man such things would only further the gap, wouldn’t they?”
The room sat in a contemplative silence.
Waltheof’s neighbour gave him an amicable punch on the shoulder. “God damned escaped Scottish monk!”
Eleanor reviewed her letter to Hugh, skipping over the opening preliminaries, and felt newly grateful to Trempwick for insisting she learned to write, a menial task usually delegated to a clerk.
The missive was brief. It grovelled, and she hated it. Begged for his understanding, pleaded with him to wait for her personal explanation before forming judgement or acting, implored him to see the many advantages. It reminded him of his words to her before she left, that she give
any marriage she were offered serious thought. It listed those advantages before Fulk was named, at the very end, as the husband she would take, and listed them in a servile way founded on Hugh’s own gain. No longer could she be seen as his rival for the throne. No longer could Trempwick claim her as his wife, and the claim would be proven as false before numerous witnesses of excellent birth. The rebellion would be gutted in a single stroke. The lands yielded to Scotland would as good as stay within English control; a good part of the money paid over to be granted to the new Earl of Alnwick, who would in turn give it back to the crown. The border would remain secure. Eleanor cast the document down, unable to read more. To see herself sum up her marriage without the barest mention of affection or happiness made her uncomfortable, as though the words might curse it.
It wouldn’t help. But better he heard it from her than another, and better she try and plant the speeds of gain in his mind than not. Constance might help nurture those seeds and calm the outrage; Eleanor prayed her sister-in-law would not abandon her completely or, failing that, would help prevent further damage for the sake of her husband and unborn child.
She took up her quill again, her hand wavered over the space at the end. Letter by letter she inscribed her plain signature at the end. The quill returned to the table; she scattered sand over the wet ink.
The letter was rolled, tied and about to be sealed when she changed her mind. Spreading the sheet back out she grabbed her quill and added five words beneath her name, feeling and her haste to get those words added lending her hand some character. “Brother, he is my
soul.”
Hawise answered the knock on Eleanor’s bedchamber door. One of the two men assigned to guard duty in the antechamber stepped in with a deep bow. “Your Highness, princess Anne is here and requesting to see you.”
Eleanor had done all there was to do, waiting for the hour of None and the audience with the king that awaited. She may as well get this over with. “Send her in, then see we are not disturbed.” Soon she would be able to exempt Fulk from that without it looking very strange.
Anne hardly waited until the three of them were alone before she burst out, “It is wonderful, isn’t it?”
Eleanor raised an eyebrow. “Is it?” She said to Hawise, “Let us have a third opinion, to break the tie. Is it?”
Anne sat down next to the maid and her embroidery. “Oh, of course it is! You get to marry him, and he becomes an earl, and the treaty is made again without either of my families paying too much, and so everyone is happy.”
The very many things Eleanor had planned to say to the girl evaporated before a flare of anger at her situation and how she’d ended up in it. Reduced to near incoherence she snapped, “Of all the ways to sink, done in by attempted help stemming from my kindness!”
Anne quailed, looking close to tears. “But you get to marry him, and this is the only way that you ever could, really.”
“Yes, I do, and yes, it is.”
“So you get what you wanted.”
“I wanted,” Eleanor gritted out, “a nice peaceful life with a knight with a crooked nose, living mostly forgotten but doing the odd bit of work to help Hugh and keep life from getting dull. Fat chance of that now. Did you ever think of what our lives will be like?”
“You will be together.”
“Which we already were. Granted, it might not have lasted, granted it was limited. And you promised us you would never say a word – now I cannot trust you with anything, one of my very few allies and only friend in Scotland as good as gone. Though I suppose it is only what I deserve for being idiot enough to trust someone so naive.” Eleanor massaged her temple, willing her temper to fade; being pitiless with Anne would only make her feel guilty later. “Oh, enough! For now I have had enough of trying to bail out the boat while a sea monster chomps at the hull and lightening toasts our sails. Set up the tafl board or something.”
The appointed hour came and Eleanor went to give the King of Scots her answer. With Fulk at her side.
Fulk said, his voice – he hoped – filled with confidence and power, “The lands are not enough. You would offer me an earldom – I want an earldom. Not a few cast offs.” Jesù, he was split between terror and wonder and trying to bargain with a king who was offering him his heart’s desire. His heart’s desire had given him some very strict instructions; he saw the sense in them and his reeling wits had done their own work to add and alter. Having done much of what she called her part, Eleanor sat silently at his side; she said it was time for him to begin playing the lord. Together they had gone through everything and decided upon what they could and couldn’t offer, what they had to have, what they needed in varying degrees of import. They? Fulk had deferred to her judgment in all save the military aspects.
The King of Scots raised his eyebrows. “Cast offs? Three key holdings along the border.”
“Two keys and one useful minor castle. Three holdings on a tiny strip of land barely enough to support them, with one city and one town and miscellaneous other settlements in need of protection. I’d never be able to man and supply the three castles – let alone the rest - fully, nor live the life I’d been raised to, nor keep my wife in decent state.”
“So greedy, for one offered so very much.”
“Greedy?” Fulk cocked his head slightly to one side. “Because I refuse to enter a death trap? That’s what this would be – I’d be torn to bits. I’ll need men, supplies, well maintained walls, and the promise of such continuing well into the future. And I’ll
never put Eleanor at risk.”
He got the impression the king was laughing at him and hiding it. “Is that so?”
Fulk set a hand on Eleanor’s arm, protective with a hint of claiming which made him giddy with elation – and with terror. He felt her muscles coil, his emotions echoed by her. After so long of hiding this first show of honesty was no small thing. “Yes. Married we face new dangers, it’s true. But if all is done right I can guard her from them, and from older ones I couldn’t do anything about before. You want things done rightly, it benefits you. If we die or fall then so it all ends; as we live so too does the effect we’ll have.” It was all so much posturing. Eleanor had told him – and Fulk could see it for himself – that much was left to be negotiated to the final terms. The lands named, the support offered, and much else, all of it needed thrashing over into something acceptable to both parties. It was their job to wring as much as they could from the king.
The King of Scots stroked his beard. “If more lands were yielded then we may be persuaded to assign them to the new earldom.”
“No.” Fulk set his right hand down on the tabletop, spread flat. Jesù in His blessed heaven!
He was
arguing with a
king! “No. I will not have it said I came to my bride with nothing but lands taken from her. You would have me be your earl? Then give me something of yours also. You would remake the border? Then do so; don’t just nibble a bit away from the old one and partition it off as something separate.”
If Fulk had ever thought the transfers of land between kings and the creation of earldoms a glorious thing then this hammering out of his earldom relieved him of his belief. It was like bargaining for a new horse at a market, only far slower and with the fetlocks replaced with towns, the gait with people, the spirit with resources, and over all the eerie awareness that the lives and places they were speaking of were very much like those he’d grown up with and in. Once he could have been passed along to a new lord as easily as this.
The final result saw him set to gain lands seated within a rough circle, starting at Embleton on the north coast, arcing gently westwards and southwards to Rochester, south to Bellingham, and then eastwards to Ashington, once again on the north coast. The lands had been taken from both kingdoms, the contribution being around equal. It had roughly trebled his earldom’s size, something Fulk observed cynically. Thus inflated Alnwick could be no more than a third of the size of the existing earldoms in both kingdoms. A third of the size and destined for a great many more troubles.
The King of Scots said to Eleanor, “Your castellans will surrender to their new earl when requested?”
“They will. If I go in person.” The majority of the border lands in question were property of the English crown, overseen by castellans selected by the former king. Knowing that the handing over of some or all of them may be required, Hugh had endowed Eleanor with the power necessary to her role as figurehead for the mission, and sent orders to them to open their gates and hand over control if told to by her; a very specific set of key words and sentences were to be used to ensure the handover was in no way compelled by threat. The other lands were held by lords, many of them currently sided with Trempwick. As traitors they stood to lose their lands if Hugh did not show clemency. The faithful lords would be offered new lands elsewhere along with compensation. Then same combination of royal held lands and brought off lords applied on the Scottish side.
Fulk held little hope of it all going smoothly.
“You will do homage before the full hall for your lands.”
Fulk replied easily, “There is no problem with that.” All the better to have so many witnesses. Eleanor had told him to play things there so her little attempt at a twist was unforeseen.
Malcolm the elder stated, “I will loan you five hundred men, to help you assert yourself, and thence to march under your banner against Trempwick.”
Five hundred. Too many to make him anything other than this king’s creature, under his wing and standing close and therefore an enemy in the eyes of the English. Too many to make him popular with any of his new subjects; loyalty to either kingdom was generally more flexible here in the north, and many claimed themselves to be of the North rather than English or Scottish, yet an army was an army – the only time you wanted it near your home was when it was protecting you. Too few to be the aid Hugh wanted. Too few to seriously oppose Trempwick’s power in the North.
Five hundred men paid by and sworn to someone other than him, selected by that other, serving only as long as that other permitted.. Unreliable, in every sense of the word.
Fulk’s palms were slick with sweat; a trickle ran down his back. His mouth was so dry, his sips at the wine provided did nothing to alleviate this and he dared not risk fuddling his wits by the tiniest measure. Frequently he asked himself what he thought he was
doing. “Your offer is generous, but I’m afraid I must instead ask you for money with which to raise my own force.”
“You will be my man; I support my own. I will not have it thought otherwise. I understand your desire to control your own and begin to build the retinue with which you will maintain your hold on your lands. Forty pounds, and four hundred men, and not otherwise.”
The haggling went on for … Fulk couldn’t hazard a guess, save that it was a long time and felt like more. He’d take two hundred and fifty men and ninety pounds. Too many men and not enough, too much money and not enough. A Scottish force of three thousand would raise rapidly and head into Northumberland to harry Trempwick.
The King of Scots refilled his goblet, hording the vessel of wine close so that if they wanted more they would have to ask his leave. “I must say I find you most disappointing, the pair of you. I hear all I hear, and find my mind strained to imagine such a depth of the attachment, and begin to find myself curiously eager to witness this manifestation of a Tristan and Iseult, or whomever. What do I see? Two people who might not care a jot for one another. No different from that which you ever were in my eyes.” He ran a finger around the rim of his gold cup, then flicked the rim with a fingernail, setting it ringing. “This will stop.”
Under the table Eleanor slipped her hand into Fulk’s. “If you are saying what I think-”
“I am saying that when the secret is revealed you will act like the pair of true loves you are meant to be. I will not be made to look a fool.”
With difficulty she kept tight rein on her temper. “And nor will we. We are not an exhibition. All will be as it should be, according to
our choice. Not yours. That is not alterable.”
“I believe my point is made clear.”
The double doors flung open with such force that they rebounded off the wall and nearly hit Malcolm as he passed through. He took in the threesome gathered. “So it’s true,” he accused. “Anne was right. God, to think I said you wouldn’t sink so bloody low.”
The King of Scots rose. “Malcolm-”
“You lying bastard!” The boy advanced to stand toe to toe with his father. “You lied! You promised her to me!”
“If you cannot win your intended bride over-”
“Shut UP!” he bellowed. Malcolm jabbed his father in the chest with a finger. “Liar! It’s obvious you never intended her for me! Like you never did put that clause in Anne’s marriage contract. You
bastard!” He gave the older man a hard shove with both hands. “You knew I’d never allow it, so you lied. You said that he couldn’t touch her until she was older, but you lied!” The king reeled back another step as his son lashed out again. “It wasn’t him who broke the contract –
you never added the bloody clause!”
Fulk found himself restrained by Eleanor’s hand on his arm, clenched about his bicep and pulling him close to her. She must have seen him tense, ready to defend either of them if the prince turned in their direction and mistaken it for an intent to aid the king.
The older Malcolm drew himself up with remarkable dignity. “It is not for you to decide anything. I am king, and your father; you are subject to me.”
Malcolm spat in his face. “There aren’t words to describe such a creature as you!”
The king wiped the spittle away with the back of his hand, and cleaned that hand by hitting his son across the mouth. “Boy, if you had the sense to see then you would learn much from what I do.”
Malcolm stumbled back, face showing white above the hand he clapped to his mouth. “Finally dirtied your own hand? Bah! In a few more years your balls might even drop, and a few years from then you might be something worth calling a man.” He removed his hand, checked it for blood and dabbed at his mouth. “Oh, I see. I see that you’re mating royalty to shit, debasing all that we are by doing so, and helping a fool squander her chance at the crown, instead letting some bastard shit have it. I see that you’re giving the things you promised me to an English nothing, and I see you’ve deceived me for too bloody long!” He took another backwards pace, looking over his shoulder at Eleanor and Fulk. “And I see I can’t stop it. Not now. It’s too damned late. Jesus bloody Christ, but I’d stop it if I could, anything but let this fucking
travesty go ahead!” And another step. He stood with his chin in the air, left hand holding the scabbard of his long dagger below where the hilt met the case. “I’m leaving. Going back to my own damned lands with my own court, back out from this pissing stuck up collection of lack-moraled bastards of yours. Don’t know why I bothered to come in the first place; it’s always the same, your honourless scuttering about makes me bloody sick to the very core. And I won’t have a part in your ‘war’, if you ever bloody well thought to let me, which you won’t have, being so damned set on holding me back and treating me like something weaker than a puling girl.” He pointed at his father. “Hear this, if nothing else goes through your bloody deaf ears: marry Anne off again like that before she’s old enough and I’ll raise my banner against you. I swear it. And don’t you fucking
dare to harm my future any more than you already have; someone has to repair all that you’ve bloody been gone and done.”
The king said calmly, “Your rebellion would be crushed, Malcolm.”
“Maybe. Maybe not. At least I’d have tried. That’s what you’re too bloody afraid of – failing.” Malcolm stopped his walk out level with Eleanor, pausing with the table between them. “He’ll use you until there’s nothing left, then drop you. But I think you’re not stupid enough to be a passive victim. You or your future… husband.” He said the word as though it burned his tongue. “So. If you want an ally, I might be interested. Possibly. But you’re still so unbelievably God-damned fucking
stupid for agreeing to this. But then it’s well known women let their emotions rule them and seldom think; bloody weak-minded.”
Some dreams went on and on, the dreamer aware and restive and unable to banish the scene that was drearily real and unsettlingly unreal at once. Usually it was the unpleasant dreams which did this, longevity in proportion to their disagreeableness. Being stuck in one while waking was a rare thing; Fulk couldn’t find a better way to describe this council, now drawing to its end. Hours had gone by, that much he could say with certainty, passed in a formless expanse measured only by the diminishing of the sun and the burning down of the lights lit thereafter.
Fulk found some cheer in the fact that his many dreams of marrying a gooseberry had never managed to be half as boring as this reality, or half as terrifying, or half as dangerous. Or half as wonderful.
The king rose, ending the meeting saying, “The alliance will be announced tomorrow morn, early. At the celebratory banquet I shall raise my earl, and set the marriage in motion, according to the design we have discussed. The muster of the two armies shall begin the day after.”
Blergh, I’m a very tired frog, and it appears amphibians in dire need of a holiday don’t write too well. Talk about your uphill (failed) struggle to add some pep into this thing. My eyes are so tired the screen makes them burn.
Those who have read the whole thing through recently and take notes on everything including the slightest detail (I don’t actually expect there to be anyone doing that!) will have noticed a short time ago that something wasn’t tallying between William’s, Anne’s, Malcolm’s and the King of Scots’ accounts of the Anne/William wedding and contract. There you go, the discrepancy is finally cleared up, and brought to the eyes of everyone else.
Now I’m going to go and try to catch up on my reading. Or, more likely, fall asleep with a book crushing my nose. Reading lying down might be more comfortable but it does have its downsides.
Igaworker: Actually, it’s the wedding and all which will be the worst to write. Probably the worst bit of the entire story. Warfare and the like I don’t mind doing, I just know I am not very practiced at it and that it is very easy for it to be boring or repetitive.
You know, my own vision of where they would end up didn’t look anything like this either. Remember some months ago … er, more like a year or more ago I suppose, I said that the characters had broken free and changed the story dramatically? This was part of those changes. The original plot came from the characters, but as they grew and developed then the story changed with them.
Judas: Long time no see
Yep, still going. 902 pages long in Word now.
Crusher Neko: The offer to put Nell on the throne was a go at a better resolution for the King of Scots. Imagine, Nell on the throne because of him, reliant on him to keep it, and very probably married to Malcolm, meaning his son being ruler of England in all but name and some detail and his grandson (if one can be managed) legitimate king of both. A long shot, and win condition number 2 (as I call the Nell/Fulk marriage) is still good.
Avernite: Not all they held dear – they still have each other.
Chargone: Welcome. Here’s the eye drops :hands them over: It’s very good to hear that even my off key moments work
Shame you can’t remember which update it was, but never mind; don’t let it worry you.
Cliffracer: Yes, she’s finally going to marry Fulk publicly.
