St. John’s Day, June 24, 1067.
To Alaric, my friend and liege, from Johan de Vaux.
Your lady wife has been informed of her position and the rights you revoked. Although surprised, she did not challenge your orders as did her aunt and companion Hortense de Tourny. They reside in High Tower. The countess will occasionally stroll about the upper ramparts. Accompanied by guards, she walks through the inner bailey, speaking to no one save her aunt. She speaks, reads, and writes French and Latin. Her aunt, and only companion, is versed in Saxon and translates for her niece.
Her chattel goods have arrived. By God’s grace, Alaric, she brought unimaginable riches. The heavy plow, blessed by Brother Derrick and pulled by horses in new chest bridles, has tilled ten furrows and clears the tree stumps and field stones with ease.
Seeding has begun, although it is too late to expect much this year. We continue to dig the fosse. The perimeter earthworks and timber walls rise. We have completed the storehouse, staked out the hall, and begun digging the well. Three monks have joined Brother Derrick. We call his unsponsored cell a priory and Derrick the prior. With my permission, they are building a temporary structure on the outer south bailey.
Marguerite continues to occupy your longhouse. She has sufficiently usurped the countess’s authority. Without a hall, there is little for her to do, save meddle with Gilbert and me as we administer your estates and build the castle’s defenses.
I shall remain vigilant.
June 1067, Tutbury, Staffordshire
Elise had looked forward to Midsummer, hoping the bonfires and dancing would bring levity to her dull days. Instead, the Normans had not stopped the work crews to celebrate, and solstice had passed with little more than a few drunken soldiers throwing lighted torches into the river.
Later that week, she and Hortense retreated to their top-floor rooms in High Tower to escape the stench of the camp privy overflowing again in the heavy rain. Elise ran her hands over the fine Persian wool that had arrived with her goods. The deep red pleased her. She’d begun making a cloak for her husband, which she would line with the sable packed into her chests. She did not intend to send it to him, supposing he might assume it a plea to ease her imprisonment. She merely needed something to do.
“Dear Aunt,” Elise said, stitching the edge of a double seam, “I fear I would go mad without you. I have no people, no church or Abbey to serve. I dwindle day to day.”
“Pluck your own feathers if you must,” Hortense said, curtly. “Languor will not defeat you. Your mind is merely lacking a worthy challenge. I will teach you the Saxon tongue. As you learn, we will plan how to boot the concubine from her pillar. For now,” she lifted the tunic in her hands, “the English call this cotte a kirtle.”
Suddenly recognizing the sound of Johan’s hobbling footsteps on the stairs, Elise and Hortense exchanged a glance and put their sewing aside.
Entering the chamber, he pushed back his wet hood and nodded a greeting to Hortense. “Lady Stafford,” he bowed. Gaining his breath, he glanced around the interior.
Would he punish her for taking liberties? Elise wondered. Most of High Tower remained as built—raw, timbered, and unfinished but she and Hortense had transformed this chamber. They had plastered and whitewashed the walls. The rough floor, scrubbed clean, now hosted an octagonal design of alternating crimson stripes and azure diamond shapes. The open shutters were green and edged with decorative blue vines. She watched him notice the stuffed cushions, the embroidered table covering, the wall hangings, and fresh-cut flowers. He seemed captivated by the decorative brazier: a hammered-copper bucket, with an open basket-weave bottom set upon a three-legged stand, its ash pan ringed with gleaming pewter.
“I am sorry to disturb you, my lady,” he said. “I am puzzled by this device found among your chattels.” He handed her a rectangular piece of wood.
He had not spoken to her directly in weeks. Elise supposed he condescended to do so from curiosity. She offered him a seat on a cushioned bench and Hortense poured him a bowl of wine.
Tilting the instrument, Elise recalled that she had brought this and other items she thought might be new to William’s kingdom. Light reflected off the horizontal band of inlaid, iridescent shells, which ran lengthwise across the center of the polished cherrywood. Vertical grooves ran from the center to the outer edge of the frame. She turned the article so that the shorter slots were on top, the longer ones on the bottom, and as she did so, oval green beads of polished lion stone slid and clinked softly within the carved tracks. She ran her index finger over the cool inlay, remembering how her cousin King Philip had dazzled her with a similar device. He did not think she could learn how to use such an ingenious contrivance, but after giving her a little instruction, she surprised him, though she took care not to appear more agile in its use than he.
“The Greeks call this an abákos,” she explained. “The Romans call these small pebbles calculi. It is used to count numbers.” She told him it had recently come to Francia through commerce with the Normans who had settled near Rome. She showed him how it worked, enjoying the sound as she slid the green beads away from the pearly axis. Johan learned quickly, and she saw his amazement as he clustered and slid the beads back and forth.
“The Church condemns its use, for it comes from infidels. Still, my seneschal uses one,” Elise said. “Have you written to him?” she asked. Seeing his suspicious frown, she continued haltingly, “He usually sends accounts of the planting, harvests, and stores at solstice and equinox. You might wish to know about his lordship’s estates in Normandie.” Johan thanked her stiffly before leaving.
Elise shrugged at Hortense and climbed up to the galleries. Sheltered from the rain beneath the eaves, she watched the storm clouds sail slowly across the sky, recalling her husband’s orders to obey his agents in all things. Despite her knowledge and capabilities, her wealth and chattel goods, she was a wife—nothing more—a singular stitch in the tapestry that held the new Norman kingdom together. These were the first few months of the rest of her life. Resistance would not free her. The appearance of acceptance might win her small concessions.
The following week, Hortense descended the stairs to the common room. But before taking the last three steps, she paused and looked over the heads of the soldiers milling about, and spotted Johan and Gilbert with the builders. She lowered her head in determination and stepped down. Short and squat, she waded with difficulty through the men standing in groups, some adjusting their armor, others drinking, laughing or arguing. As she neared the table, her breath caught when she saw Gilbert’s second-in-command.
With a slight bow, the aged knight moved aside.
Her heart pounding, she glided by without a word and approached the table to wait for Johan or Gilbert to notice her. The men leaned over a table, studying a cloth. She recognized a map of the castle as Johan, using a piece of burnt wood, drew several lines. Gilbert pointed to another mark, and the builders spoke of their progress. Behind her, she heard the old warrior clear his throat.
“My lord.” His deep, clear voice sent familiar shivers up her spine.
Gilbert looked up, and seeing Hortense, he directed Johan’s attention to her.
“Good morning, gentle men,” Hortense said. “A word when you are able.”
“Excellent timing as usual, Lady Hortense. We are finished here.” Johan said.
As the builders rolled up the cloth and departed, Hortense began. “Although her ladyship has obeyed his lordship’s requests in all things, her sequestration is tedious. Her limitations would be more tolerable if she were allowed to ride daily.”
“Her ladyship would not be safe beyond the castle’s walls,” Johan said.
“Even with an armed guard? Enough men to ensure her safety?”
Johan and Gilbert exchanged glances before Gilbert looked beyond Hortense to his second-in-command standing behind her. Although she felt the soldier’s gaze, she kept her eyes on the castellan.
“Led by an experienced captain,” Hortense said to Gilbert as her cheeks heated, “her ladyship could ride with the knights who daily course the castle’s immediate domain, all within view of the soldiers on the ramparts. And I shall remain here, a hostage, if you will, to assure you of her timely return.”
“We will give this matter consideration, Lady Hortense,” Johan said. “Have you other requests?”
“I do. There is much to do before winter, and her ladyship detests idleness. Perhaps she could undertake a few tasks.”
“Such as?” Johan said, suspicion in his voice.
“Tasks deemed useful by any wise seneschal, Johan.” She turned, and with her head high, walked back toward the stairs.
July 1067, Tutbury, Staffordshire
The looming tower behind taunted Elise with the depth of her imprisonment. Holding herself rigid in the saddle, she rode beside Jeoffroi d’Ardain ahead of the others, past watchtowers, gatehouses, and sentries posted along Castle Road. Impressive barriers should she ever try to leave on her own.
Her attempt to converse with him met silence, and upon leaving the village, he charged ahead as his fifty knights moved forward, placing her at the center. They rode hard and fast and blocked her mare from dropping back as they traveled around the valley and over the moors.
She understood immediately. They would try to dissuade her from riding with them, hoping that after a hard, miserable day in the saddle, she would never wish to ride again. Knowing she would be stiff and sore, she disguised her discomfort and endured without complaint the mud from lead horses splattering her. When they stopped to rest, she dismounted without stumbling, stood straight as a pine tree without quaking, and, when ready walked her mare to the creek. Afterward, without the aid normally extended to a lady in their midst, she checked her mount’s hooves, tightened the girth and, with the aid of an outcropping, she remounted—and even managed to stay aright.
At the end of another stop, as she prepared to remount, two men began to argue. A push received an answering shove, and within moments nearly half the knights were engaged in a full-fledged rough and tumble brawl. Sensing the exhibit intended to frighten her, she stepped calmly out of the way and waited. When the men finished, as they wiped blood from their fists and faces, she turned to d’Ardain standing nearby who no doubt expected her to squawk like a wing-flapping hen. “Shall we proceed?”
Within a week, the knights became accustomed to her presence. They rode a little slower, which she assumed was their usual pace, knowing it would be difficult otherwise for them and their horses to respond to a sudden threat. She took care to appear uninterested in them and in the immediate vicinity, though she began to recognize several knights and how they split up, some riding the perimeter, others entering the woodlands. Soon, a separate retinue of ten knights, led by d’Ardain, accompanied her about the immediate vicinity, as the larger company ranged through the countryside.
Despite the rain and the increasingly hot days, her daily rides continued. As her outings took on a regular pattern, her guards began to relax their vigilance. She intensified hers, noting the terrain, proximity to the roads, and trails leading to the river and into the woods.
The charred structures hugging the escarpment she’d seen when she first arrived were gone. The ditch had taken their place. More cottages existed now. Merchants traveled Burton Road, troops marched through the village, small units of knights arrived and departed.
Studying High Tower from afar, she supposed it signaled that the Normans had conquered the English and all would be well, but she’d put hoardings over the open ramparts and shore up the gate towers at the base of the Castle Road. She’d build a timber wall around the village as well, keeping it small and compact against attack.
One day, d’Ardain hesitated before giving her a small bow and quiver. She nearly laughed, reading his caution as concern she might use them against her guards. The weapon, useful for small game, would not injure armored men. Still, it was a welcome privilege, she thought, as they rode into the woods for the first time.
It appeared that the villagers had encroached only the fringes of the woods. A coppice separated the marshes from the thicket, and almost immediately, a deeply rutted road wound around massive trees, whose size humbled her. All of them indicated a wood far older than any she’d seen in Normandie. She felt a sudden chill. Did moss folk watch from the shadows? The nuns had proclaimed that demons and devils, elves and witches inhabited the wilds, and she looked for the poisonous mist slithering in the underbrush until they moved into a single file to pass a wagon and pairs of oxen dragging felled logs to the village. She wondered where the road went, if there were others, for neither a company of knights nor soldiers afoot could easily get through the tangled wilderness flanking them.
They took a barely visible trail leading off the road and into the deep woods. Awe settled over her when they walked their horses past an ancient elm with a trunk wider than two horses, nose to tail. Her gaze traveled up the branches, which seemed to her the thickness of any common tree and which spanned more than forty paces from one end to the other. Elise ached to climb this majestic tree and disappear among the fairies fluttering the leaves. She glanced at her guards, appalled by her pagan thought, and found d’Ardain studying her. His unguarded gaze shifted quickly, but not before she saw a glint of resentment. It sobered her. No doubt, he had more important duties than guarding her.