The groom led William’s horse away to the stables and in the purple dusk, as the first stars of snow began to fall, William embraced his wife with tender hunger. She kissed him, oblivious of the audience of knights and retainers. “I was counting down the days to Christmas and beginning to wonder if you would arrive in time,” she said.
William laughed with wryness and pleasure. “I was counting down the days too. I’ve missed you hard.” His look grew concerned. “How have you been faring? You look beautiful.”
Isabelle pressed her hand lightly over her womb. “I am beginning to look as if I have done nothing but sit by the fire and eat bread pudding,” she answered ruefully, “but I am well. The sickness stopped soon after I arrived at Striguil.”
William nodded and felt relieved. Isabelle had wanted to remain at court with him, but she had been unwell in the early months of her pregnancy and as the court was constantly on the move, she had had little opportunity for rest. While Queen Eleanor was sympathetic to Isabelle’s condition, she had not wanted a puking pregnant woman attending on her. William had to stay with Richard and he had deemed it best for Isabelle to go to Striguil. She was its Countess; she could take fealty of her vassals, make treaties with her neighbours, see to the interests of the earldom, and at the same time rest in one place.
“The child has quickened,” she told him as she led him towards the hall. “Not that you can feel with the palm of your hand as yet, but I have felt him stirring within my womb.”
“Him?” William said with a smile.
Isabelle nodded with calm serenity. “It will be a son,” she said.
William gazed at the keep as they approached it. The entrance was via a timber stair that led up to a decorated entrance with a guardroom to the left and a door to an undercroft beneath. The castle had been built by the Norman warlord William FitzOsbern in the years immediately following the Norman Conquest and although some work had been done to keep it strong, William thought that there was room for expansion and improvement. The great hall itself was a large rectangle set above the storeroom, with a fire burning in a large central hearth. Benches occupied niches created by decorative blind arches cut into the walls. Banners and hangings draped the white plasterwork, and an array of painted shields, alternating round and kite-shaped, English and Norman. A doorway at the end of the hall gave on to an external stair while an internal stair led to the private quarters set into the roof space and it was to this that Isabelle drew William.
The room above could hardly be called a solar, although there were a couple of squints looking out on to the river side of the keep. The space was divided into two rooms by a heavy woollen curtain—an antechamber for attendants and an inner sanctum where the lord and lady could enjoy a modicum of privacy. The latter was cosy with the heat of several charcoal braziers and there was a large bed, lined with straw and piled with two thick feather mattresses. Isabelle’s painted marriage coffer stood beside it and another large wooden chest for William’s gear. A cradle of polished cherry wood nestled in a corner. William went to look at it, tried to imagine it filled with a baby, and felt his stomach wallow with anticipation and fear. Not wanting to show the latter to Isabelle, he busied himself removing his cloak and hood. His squires had followed them upstairs with items of baggage and Isabelle’s ladies waited unobtrusively in the background. William dismissed them all. Later he would take proper stock of Striguil and attend to outstanding business. Later he would have time for others, but just now he was feeling rather selfish.
William laid his hand on Isabelle’s softly rounded belly and kissed her throat beneath her loose, fair hair. Her pulse thundered in time with his heartbeat and her breath was as short as his as they slowly returned from the pleasure of rediscovering each other’s bodies. He laughed softly. “I have gone for years without the comfort of a woman in my bed,” he told her, “but now, after two months away from you, I feel like a green boy with his first woman.”
“You said that before, at Stoke,” Isabelle said huskily.
“Well, it’s true. It is what you do to me.”
“You didn’t feel like a green boy to me.”
“But too hasty…”
“Not for me. You have been two months away from me also.” She stroked his face. “We have all the winter’s night before us, and a double feather mattress and warm furs…there is time for leisure as well as haste.”
Her words, her light, deliberate touch, brought weakness and warmth to William’s limbs and he wrapped her in his arms and kissed her again. Isabelle responded fervently, then pulled away and laughed as William’s stomach rumbled as loudly as distant thunder.
“Shame on me,” she said, “for putting my own desires before the needs of a starving man!”
“That would depend on what I was starving for the most,” William interrupted with a lazy smile, “but I wouldn’t refuse food now, especially if I’ve to spend the night in leisure and haste. Besides,” he added, sobering and reaching for the furred robe lying half on the bed, half on the floor, “there are things I have to tell you, and it’ll be easier whilst eating than making love.” Rising, he went to a low trestle table where food and drink had been set out. A leek and almond pottage had been keeping hot under a small brazier of coals and there was wheaten bread freshly baked, soft and fresh. Whatever refinements the sturdy, dour Striguil was lacking, Isabelle’s cook was not one of them. William had known he was hungry, but hadn’t realised the extent of the hollow feeling in his stomach until he sat down and began to eat. Isabelle joined him, and if William had had any lingering doubts about the state of her health, it was dissipated by the sight of her tucking into the food almost as heartily as himself. He hoped that what he was about to tell her would not destroy her appetite.
“So,” Isabelle said as she broke another morsel of bread and dipped it in her rapidly vanishing pottage, “what do you have to tell me that is better suited to soup than coupling?”
William snorted at her words. “I am not sure that it is suited to either activity.” He let his own spoon rest. “The Earl of Essex is dead, God rest his soul.” He crossed himself. “Of a quartan fever in Normandy.”
Isabelle crossed herself too, her expression filling with distress for the man she had known and liked, and then, with the dismay of a deeper realisation. “He was to be the joint justiciar,” she said.
“Richard has appointed William Longchamp in his place.” William made a face. “The choice was not unexpected, but it’s still a blow. The only consolation is that four sub-justiciars have been appointed to regulate those who might be tempted to abuse their power with Richard gone.”
“Then I hope such men are our allies.” Isabelle set her bowl aside. She fixed William with a sombre gaze.
William smiled diffidently. “Well, one is at least,” he said, “because Richard has appointed me to a position. We are answerable only to him and the Queen.”
Isabelle’s eyes widened. “That is excellent news!” Her expression brightened. “Who are the others?”
He told her, leaning forward and taking her hands, and she was pleased to hear the names. William Briwerre, Geoffrey FitzPeter, and Roger FitzReinfrey were men of similar ilk to her husband, raised through the ranks and of trusted mettle. Longchamp was trusted mettle too and of humble background, but in his case he had sought to eradicate that stigma by behaving as if he had been born royal. “Of course,” William added with a grimace, “as well as Longchamp, we’ll have to keep an eye on the ambitions of Prince John and there is bound to be friction between the two of them. You saw the posturing before you left court.”
“But you can do it,” she said with conviction. “You have the strength.”
“I suppose I’ll find that out, won’t I?”
Isabelle narrowed her eyes and decided that his tone bespoke assurance rather than uncertainty. He had changed in the months they had been apart. It was as if a sword had been taken from the armoury and honed on a grindstone until its edge was blue and keen.
He drained his wine and refused her offer of more. “I’m summoned to attend the King in Normandy before Eastertide,” he said, glancing at her belly. “It’s going to be hard leaving you behind.”
