To The Castle - Joan Wolf

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you’ll ever have seen, my lord. And he has a colt out of him by a splendid mare. Those are the horses you’ll be wanting to see.”

      The horses were brought, the big chestnut stallion immediately intimidating Nell by rearing, and a bay mare with a chestnut colt at her side that was the image of his sire.

      Nell kept her distance from the horses, making sure not to come too close to those iron-shod hooves. Roger walked right up to the stallion however, and got him to stand by simply telling him to do so. Nell couldn’t help being impressed. He then went over the entire animal, even running his hand down each hard leg. He checked over the mare and the colt in the same fashion.

      “You’re right,” he said to the head groom. “These are superior horses. No wonder Earl Raoul is proud of them.”

      The redhead grinned.

      “Thank you for showing them to us,” Roger said.

      Nell looked at him. She liked it that Roger had thanked the head groom. Her father never thanked the people who worked for him, but Mother Superior always did. She had said that everyone is loved by God, and we should never forget to give people the respect that they deserve.

      They continued their walk around the bailey, past the archery butts where the knights were practicing, past the kitchen garden where the vegetables for the household were grown, past the lines of laundered clothes that were hung out to dry.

      As they walked, Roger’s mind grappled with the situation that faced him. He was to wed a girl who might not be willing. This was not a possibility that had ever occurred to him. In its own way, it presented as many difficulties as if she had turned out to be strange in the head.

      He had to address it. She was very pretty and he would like to marry her, but something in him recoiled from taking a woman against her will.

      He put his hand on her arm and stopped her. They turned to face each other in the sunshine. “Nell,” he began carefully, “I don’t know if you know this, but the Pope has ruled that a woman cannot be forced to marry against her will. You can appeal to the church if that is the case. So let me ask you now, are you making this marriage willingly?”

      No, I’m not, was her immediate reaction.

      But she couldn’t answer him that way. The convent was closed to her; there was no place else for her to go. She shuddered at the thought of confronting her father with the news that she had told this man she wouldn’t marry him. She couldn’t defy her father. She didn’t have it in her.

      She looked at her hands, which were clasped over her gold belt. “Yes,” she said in such a low voice that he had to bend his head to hear her. “I am marrying you willingly, my lord.”

      “Are you sure?”

      Tears stung behind her eyes. It occurred to her that he was the only person so far who had cared how she felt. “Yes,” she whispered. “I’m sure.”

      “All right,” he said. He lifted her chin with his thumb, so she had to look up into his face. He smiled at her. “I’m not such a bad fellow, Nell. There’s no reason why we shouldn’t get along.”

      Her lips trembled and she blinked away her tears. “I will try to be a good wife to you, my lord.”

      “And I will try to be a good husband to you.” He bent from his superior height and touched his lips to her cheek. “You’re a beautiful girl,” he said. “I consider myself a lucky man.”

      Nell didn’t feel lucky, but it occurred to her that things could be worse. At least Roger seemed kind.

      She said in a low voice, “You will have to be patient with me. I know very little of the ways of the world.”

      He took her hand into his. “Don’t worry, little Nell,” he said. “I will take care of you. Everything is going to be all right.”

      Six

      Nell retired to her bedroom that evening with a hard knot of tension in her stomach. What had once been marriage in the abstract had suddenly become very real.

      Gertrude, the handmaid who had been serving her since she’d come home, helped her to disrobe. Most of the Norman upper class slept naked, but Nell had worn a nightgown in the convent, and she continued to cling to this custom.

      Gertrude was brushing her hair when her mother came into the room. “I want to talk to you, Nell,” Lady Alice said.

      Gertrude curtsied to Lady Alice and left mother and daughter alone.

      Lady Alice went to sit beside Nell on the bed. She picked up her daughter’s hand. “Roger is a very handsome lad,” she said. “I foresee a happy future for you, Nell.”

      “He seems nice,” Nell said woodenly.

      “Tomorrow we will go into Lincoln and the day after that you will be married. This may be the last time I have a chance to speak to you privately.” She squeezed Nell’s hand gently. “I think I should tell you about what happens between a man and a woman when they are wed. I have a feeling that you are completely innocent of this matter and I don’t want you to be shocked on your wedding night.”

      Nell looked at the flowing white linen that was draped over her knees and didn’t answer.

      Lady Alice said, “Do you know how a man and a woman make a baby?”

      Nell shook her head and continued to look at her lap.

      Her mother then described the act of lovemaking, and what Nell was to expect on her wedding night. Nell was speechless, unable to comprehend what she was hearing.

      “It’s not so bad,” her mother said. “I know it probably sounds frightening to you, but it can be pleasurable, Nell.”

      Nell thought it sounded terrible. This man, whom she scarcely knew, was going to do this to her? She looked at her mother. “Mama,” she said hoarsely, “I’m not ready to do that yet.”

      Lady Alice shook her head. “I wish we could have waited for a while to have this wedding. You are too new from the convent to appreciate how lucky you are to be marrying a fine young man like Roger. But the men wouldn’t wait and you are just going to have to resign yourself, my dear. You are going to have to let Roger do what he wants—that is the nature of marriage, I’m afraid.”

      Nell’s stomach heaved. “The basin,” she said. “Mama…”

      Lady Alice grabbed the washbasin that reposed on Nell’s side table and Nell vomited into it.

      “You can’t do this tomorrow, Nell,” she said sharply. “I sympathize with you, but you are going to have to do your duty. At least you are not going to an old man with sour breath and no hair. Your bridegroom is the kind of young man that most girls would give anything to marry. Show some backbone.”

      “I’m sorry, Mama,” Nell said miserably.

      “Perhaps I shouldn’t have spoken to you tonight. Perhaps I should have let you find out for yourself.”

      Nell shook her head. “No. I’m glad you told me. At least I can prepare myself now.”

      “That’s my good girl.” Lady Alice stood up. “Now let’s get Gertrude to clean up this mess.”

      After Lady Alice had left and the washbasin had been removed, Nell crawled into bed and curled up into a tight little ball. Roger’s words from this afternoon kept going through her mind. The Pope has decreed that no one can force a woman to marry against her will.

      What if she cited this proclamation by the Pope? What if she refused to make this marriage?

      She thought of how angry her father would be.

      She thought of what Mother Superior and Sister Helen had said to her.

      She thought of her mother.

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