LITMIR.BIZ

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      David the dwarf nudged Alys in the ribs. ‘You will sit in the body of the hall,’ he said. ‘Come on, I’ll find you a place.’ He led the way, with his rolling, half-lame stride, between the tables. But before he could seat Alys at an empty place there was a ripple of excitement in the hall. David turned around and tapped Alys’ arm, directing her attention to the high table. ‘Now you watch!’ he said triumphantly. ‘You see the welcome he gets, my Lord Hugh! You see!’

      The tapestry behind the table on the dais was drawn back, the little arched door opened, and Lord Hugh stepped through and took his place in the great carved chair at the plumb centre of the table. There was a moment’s surprised silence and then suddenly there was a great roar of delight as the soldiers and servants cheered and hammered the table with their knives and drummed their boots against the benches.

      Alys smiled at the welcome, and saw how the old lord nodded his bony head in one direction and then in another. ‘He looks well!’ she thought. After nearly a week of seeing him as an invalid, in the cramped room of the tower, she was surprised to see him now as the lord at his own table. He had flushed a little, with the heat and with pleasure at his howling, yelling welcome. I cured him! Alys thought, with sudden, surprised pleasure. I cured him! They left him for dead but I cured him. Hidden by her drooping sleeves she stretched out her hands, feeling her power flow through her, down to her fingertips.

      Alys had cured people before, vagrants and sick paupers in the infirmary, farmers in their heavy beds, peasants on pallets. But the old lord was the first man she had made well and seen rise up and take his power, great power. And I did that! Alys said to herself. I had the skill to cure him. I made him well.

      She looked at him, smiling at the thought, and then the curtain behind him moved again and the young Lord Hugo came into the hall.

      He was as tall as his father, with his father’s sharp bony face. He had his father’s black piercing eyes too, and his beaky nose. There were deep lines either side of his mouth, and two lines at the roots of his eyebrows like a permanent scowl. But then someone shouted, ‘Holloa! Hugo!’ from the benches and his face suddenly lit up as if someone had put a brand to a haystack, in the merriest, most joyful smile. Alys said, ‘Mother of God!’

      ‘What is it?’ David said, shooting a look at her. ‘Have you the Sight? Have you seen something?’

      ‘No,’ Alys said, in an instant denial. ‘I see nothing. I see nothing. I just saw …’ she broke off. ‘I just saw him smile,’ she said helplessly. She tried to look towards David but she could not take her eyes from the young lord. He stood, his hand resting casually on the back of his chair, his face turned towards his father. A jewel on his long fingers winked in the torchlight, an emerald, as green as his bulky doublet, and his velvet cap sat askew on his black curly hair.

      ‘There’s the shrew,’ David said. ‘Coming to sit on my lord’s left.’

      Alys hardly heard him. She was still staring at the young lord. It was he who had been there at the burning of the abbey. It was he who had laughed as the tiles on the roof cracked like fireworks in the heat and the lead had poured down like a blazing waterfall. It was his fault that the abbey was burned, that Mother Hildebrande was dead, and Alys alone and vulnerable in the world again. He was a criminal, in the deepest and darkest of sin. He was an arsonist – a hateful crime. He was a murderer. Alys looked at his severe face and knew she should hate him as her enemy. But Hugo had charm as potent as any magic. His father said something which amused him and he flung back his head to laugh and Alys felt herself smiling too – as people will laugh with a child or smile for another’s upsurging joy. Alys looked down the length of the hall at Hugo and knew that, unseen and unnoticed, her own face was alight with pleasure at seeing him.

      ‘See that woman’s pride!’ the dwarf said with disdain.

      The young lord’s wife was tall and looked older than him. She carried her power around her like a cloak. Her face as she scanned the hall was impassive, her welcome to her father-in-law was coolly perfect. She hesitated for a courteous second before sitting so the lords were seated first. Then she looked directly down the hall and saw Alys.

      ‘Bow,’ the dwarf said. ‘Bow! Get your head down for God’s sake! She’s looking at you.’

      Alys held the woman’s cold grey stare. ‘I will not,’ she said.

      Lady Catherine turned to one of the women seated behind her and asked a question. The woman stared at Alys, and then beckoned a servant. Alys was aware of the chain of command, and of the lowliest servant coming towards her, but she did not take her eyes from Lady Catherine’s face.

      ‘Two cats on a barn roof,’ David said under his breath.

      Alys found her palms were tingling from her fingernails driven into them. She was holding her hands in tight fists, hidden by the sweep of the long sleeves.

      ‘Lady Catherine says you’re to go forward!’ the servant said, skidding to a halt before her on the dirty rushes. ‘Go up to the high table. She wants you!’

      Alys glanced at David. ‘Go your ways,’ he said. ‘I’m for my dinner. You go for the cat fight. Come straight to my lord’s room after dinner. No dawdling.’

      Alys nodded, still not taking her eyes from Lady Catherine’s square, sallow face. Then she walked slowly up the length of the hall.

      One by one the chattering men and women fell silent to watch her. A great wolfhound growled and then followed Alys up the centre of the hall, up the wide nave between the tables until she was standing with two hundred people staring at her back and Lady Catherine’s cold eyes staring at her face.

      ‘We have to thank you for your skill,’ Lady Catherine said. Her voice was flat with the ugly vowel sounds of the southerner. ‘You seem to have restored my lord to perfect health.’

      The words were kind but the look that accompanied them was ice.

      ‘I did no more than my duty,’ Alys said. She did not take her eyes from Lady Catherine’s face.

      ‘You could tempt me to fall sick tomorrow!’ the young lord said easily with a laugh. The officers on the benches nearest the table laughed with him. Someone whistled a long, low whistle. Alys looked only at him. His black eyes were hooded, lazy, his smile was as warm as if they shared a secret. It was an invitation to bed as clear as a mattins bell to church. Alys felt the blood rising to her face in a slow deep blush.

      ‘Don’t wish it, my lord!’ Lady Catherine said evenly. Then she turned again to Alys. ‘Where do you come from?’ she asked sharply.

      ‘Bowes Moor,’ Alys replied.

      Lady Catherine frowned. ‘Your speech is not from here,’ she said suspiciously.

      Alys bit the inside of her lips. ‘I lived for some years in Penrith,’ she said. ‘I have kin there. They speak softer and they taught me to read aloud.’

      ‘You can read?’ the old lord asked.

      Alys nodded. ‘Yes, my lord,’ she said.

      ‘Can you write?’ he asked, astonished. ‘English and Latin?’

      ‘Yes, my lord,’ Alys replied.

      The young lord slapped his father on the shoulder. ‘There’s your clerk for you!’ he said. ‘A wench for a clerk! You can count on her not to rise up in the church and leave you!’

      There was a laugh from the head of the long table nearest the dais and a man in the dark robe of a priest raised his hand to Hugo like a swordsman acknowledging a hit.

      ‘Better than none,’ the old lord said. He nodded at Alys. ‘You may not go home yet,’ he said gruffly. ‘I need some writing done. Get a seat for yourself.’

      Alys nodded and turned to a place at the back of the hall.

      ‘No,’ the young lord said. He turned to his father. ‘If she’s to be your clerk she’d best sit up here,’ he said. ‘You

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