Signy reached out, desperately grasping for the wall to steady herself.
Her head spun. A cold sweat rolled down her temples and cheeks. Then her fingers did find the wall and she leaned against it, pressing her face against the rough surface as if greeting a dear friend. Slowly the nausea eased, but the sweat did not dry in the oppressive air of the upper rooms.
It is over, she thought. It is done with. Yet she trembled with the weakness of a newborn babe. The innkeeper’s niece squeezed her eyes shut to keep from weeping.
Below her, the patrons of her uncle’s inn shouted. A few sang bawdy songs, and their raucous joy rose with the stench of their hot bodies.
Signy took a deep breath, taking in the familiar smell to reassure herself that the world was no different than it had been but a few minutes ago. Turning around, she leaned her back against the wall. A sharp twig protruding from the hard clay wall scratched her arm. From the thatch above her, she heard a familiar rustling. Rat or mouse most likely, creatures she hated, but tonight their stubborn presence was a source of comfort.
“I loathe Martin,” she muttered and felt better for having said it. Why should she feel otherwise? He was a man who took whatever he wanted, discarded it at will, but always left evidence of his possession like gangrene in a poisoned wound.
“And I hate his foul jests,” she said.
Bringing Ivetta here on a regular basis, as if the inn were a brothel, was just one example. Why not swyve the town whore midst the wood splinters on the floor of his cooper’s shop, when he wanted a woman, or rent out his stinking bed when he had a paying customer for her?
“Because he wished to mock me,” she answered herself.
Signy pushed herself upright, walked slowly to the top of the stairs, and looked down at the milling crowd below. The inn was a profitable enough business, so why did her uncle permit this blatant whoring? Surely it did not bring him that much extra coin.
“I like the king’s face on silver as much as my kinsman,” Signy whispered, “but I would have spat in Martin’s face, not grasped his hand in agreement, when he suggested this arrangement.”
Of course she had particular grounds to hate such a proposition, the cause of which her uncle was quite ignorant. But Martin knew her reasons well and found especial pleasure in the distress this whoring brought her. “I may not be chaste,” she said, as if arguing with some critic in the shadows, “but I have never given myself for gain.”
Not that many of the men below had not hoped otherwise when she first came to serve at the inn, but her uncle soon knocked several heads together. The word quickly spread that the innkeeper’s niece might be a buxom lass, but her body was not for hire. Now she might still suffer ribald jests but only the occasional, rude touch. The former she answered with light and practiced retorts. The latter she greeted with the prick of a pin she kept secreted in her sleeve.
Signy looked behind her at the closed door. The nausea returned, and she quickly shifted her gaze around to the room below. Straightening her back, she started down the narrow stairs. “Business is good,” she said aloud. That would please her uncle as much as it did her.
Halfway down, she stopped and bent to look toward the inn door. Old Tibia must have left, she thought. Her heart ached for the poor soul, alone in the world and growing aged without kin to take her in. Although she and her uncle might disagree about allowing Ivetta, the harlot, to ply her trade in the room above, they did not argue about giving the old woman a meal and a cup of weak ale.
In the past, the woman had often sat at that bench near the door and earned enough crumbs by selling remedies to ease mortal ills to keep herself alive. She enjoyed an especially brisk business in herbs that counteracted the effects of too much ale and was known to have tonics that helped men plagued by impotence. Even after the priory hospital became so popular, she kept her following of those who preferred not to share their particular sins with lay brothers, many of whom were reputed to be gossips. In the last few months, however, Tibia had plied her trade less and less.
Signy shook her head. The old woman must be suffering so much pain now from her back and leg that death would be a joy. Youth surely had its curses, but those attendant upon the aged must be harsher to bear. Was there some merit in dying before the hair turned gray?
She glanced back at the now invisible room above, shuddered, and hurried down the remaining stairs.
Easing her way through the crowd of men shouting orders for food and drink, she caught sight of Ralf the crowner, still in his corner and staring at nothing, grim as ever. Through the crush of milling bodies, she watched him for a moment without danger of being seen. He had reason enough these days for that dour look after the death of his wife. A pang of sympathy did prick her heart, and she asked herself if she had finally forgiven him for using her so cruelly that brief time now past.
She rolled the thought around in her mind as if seeking out any hidden bitterness. One part of her argued she should not condemn him. After all, wasn’t it simply a man’s nature to care little if the soft body he rode so casually offered that sweet ride out of love? Another now roundly cursed that she had been born one of Eve’s descendants, creatures with much cause to resent God’s decision to make them helpmeets to Adam. “Our Lord should have chosen some other to serve instead—like the perfidious serpent,” Signy muttered.
As she watched Ralf pick up his pitch-sealed jack of ale, hesitate, and then drink with eyes shut, she felt a sharp pain in her heart. How many times had she watched this small habit of his and smiled?
She clenched her fist and hurled silent abuse at his head. The very next moment, her heart cooled her fury and she concluded she was being unfair to the man.
He was rude, prickly as a hedgehog, but a good man who had loved another for many years. Of course she had heard the tales before she took him into her bed, but she imagined she could turn his heart away from a woman who was now a nun. Instead, he cried out Sister Anne’s name while swyving Signy.
“Had he wanted something more than a mere vessel in which to release his seed,” she muttered, “I could have been patient and taught him how kindly I could love. Instead, he ran off to court and married a woman with land. Fa!” She spat. “No better than his greedy boor of a brother, he is.”
An arm brushed against her breast.
Signy felt her face turn hot with angry humiliation, and she reached for her pin.
The man looked down at her, blinking with drunken concentration. “I meant nothing. I was pushed,” he slurred, nervously casting his glance sideways to measure the distance to the inn door should the innkeeper seek amends.
Signy nodded forgiveness and then pushed a path through the bodies toward the door herself. When she reached cooler air, her thoughts slipped back to the deceitful crowner. At least she had not quickened with child from her brief bedding with Ralf before he deserted her. She shook with a brief chill.
A pregnancy would have caused her much difficulty at the inn. Although some in the village suspected that she had granted her favors to the man, there was no obvious proof that she had shared her bed with Ralf. Rumors were whispered, but they often were even where there was no truth in the tales. Had she provided evidence with a rounded belly, however, many would have called her whore as they did Ivetta, and men would have expected similar service.
The moment her courses failed she could have sought out old Tibia. Sin though it was, women in the village often did, willing to do penance rather than chance hunger by failing to help at harvest time or see yet another wee loved one die. But this would have been Ralf’s child. Would she have rid herself of a babe she might have loved? With clenched fist against her heart, she thanked God she had not had to make that choice.
“Sweet Signy!” a merry fellow shouted as he exited the inn. “The ale tastes bitter without you to serve it.”
“Yet it seems you have drunk enough of it not to know which soft hand passed you that last jug!”
The man belched with good cheer, gave a genial wave, and staggered down the road to his bed.
Watching him, she mused how strange it was that reputation depended on what rumors were about and the credence given them. As long as a woman was not flagrant with her lovers, others could pretend she was virtuous if they had little else to quarrel with her about. That was a fragile state of affairs, but, truth be told, she had taken few enough lovers to keep the rumble of gossip low. Ralf had been the first in a long time, and she had lain with him only once. Since then, she had been chaste enough, although some now claimed she had caught Tostig’s eye.
She sighed and walked back into the inn. Would she mind if that were the case? Despite coming to the inn many evenings and speaking at length with both her and her uncle, the tall Saxon had yet to claim any love for her, nor had he even suggested they lie together. Perhaps his only interest at the inn lay in the priory ale he had to sell.
Signy glanced back in the direction of the now-invisible crowner, tossed her head, and picked up a sweating jug. Tostig was a handsome man, she decided. If he begged sweetly, she might consider taking him to bed. That was a thought pleasant enough to soothe her bruised heart.
She smiled and served a table of thirsty men.
As she looked around for others in need of food or drink, she was relieved not to see either Hob or Will. If God were kind, they would have left. Of the two brothers, Hob was usually harmless. Although sullen in nature, he avoided confrontation when by himself. Will, on the other hand, was both choleric and brutal. That noted, the brothers caused trouble when Will had had too much to drink. Although prone to starting fights, he was a coward when attacked. Hob, it was, who had to protect his elder brother with his fists.
Signy slammed the jug down on a table. If she ever did inherit this inn from her childless uncle, as he had promised, she would hire a strong man to throw such fellows out. “Under my ownership,” she muttered softly, “this inn will countenance neither harlots nor fights.”
“A bowl of your fine stew, served with your pretty hands, would be a pleasure, lass!” shouted a man nearby, his gaze savoring the curves of Signy’s heavy breasts.
“Would your wife like to know how our cook prepares it?” the innkeeper’s niece replied with forced humor, softening it with a dazzling smile.