The Wise Woman

Thirteen

Morach was unruly about bathing, ashamed of being naked before Alys, certain that water would make her ill.

'You smell,' Alys said frankly. 'You smell disgusting, Morach. Lady Catherine will never have you near her smelling like this. You're as bad as a dungheap in August.' 'Then she can send me back to my cottage,' Morach grumbled while the servants came up the stairs with the big bath and the cans of hot water. 'I didn't ask for some lout of a man to come riding all over my garden and snatch me off to come to help a woman in childbirth for a baby that's only just conceived.'

'Oh, hush,' Alys said impatiently. 'Wash yourself, Morach. All over. And your hair too.'

She left Morach with the steaming bath and when she returned, with a gown from the chest, Morach was wrapped in the counterpane from the bed, as near to the fire as she could get.

'Folks die of wetting,' she said dourly. 'They die of dirt as well,' Alys retorted. 'Put this on.' She had chosen a simple green gown for Morach, a working woman's gown with no stomacher and no overskirt; and when she was dressed and the girdle tied, and a foot of material stitched up into a thick hem, she looked well.

'How old are you, Morach?' Alys asked curiously. She seemed to have stayed the same age for all of Alys' life. Forever bent-backed, forever greying, forever lined, forever dirty.

'Old enough,' Morach said unhelpfully. 'I'm not wearing that damned cap.'

'I'll just comb your hair then,' Alys said. Morach fended her off. 'Stop it, Alys,' she said. 'I may be far from my hearthside, but I don't change. I don't want you touching me, I don't want to touch you. I am a hedgehog, not a coney. Keep your hands off me and you won't get prickled.'

Alys recoiled. 'You've never wanted me touching you,' she said. 'Even when I was a little girl. Even when I was a baby I doubt you touched me more than you had to. I can't remember sitting on your knee. I can't remember you holding my hand. You're a cold woman, Morach, and a hard one. And you brought me up longing and longing for a little tenderness.'

'Well, you found it, didn't you?' Morach demanded, unrepentant. 'You found the mother you wanted, didn't you?'

'Yes,' Alys said, recognizing the truth of it. 'Yes, I did find her. And I thank God I found her before I had tumbled into Tom's arms for gratitude.'

Morach gleamed. 'And how did you repay love?' she asked. 'When you found your mother, when you found the woman to hold you and kiss you goodnight and tell you stories of the saints, and teach you to read and to write? What sort of a daughter were you, Alys?'

Alys turned a white face to Morach. 'Don't,' she said.

'Don't?' Morach asked, deliberately dense. 'Don't what? Don't say that all this love counted for so much that at the first sniff of smoke you were away like a scalded cat? Don't remind you that you left her to burn with all your sisters while you skipped home at an easy pace? Don't remind you that you're a Judas?

'I may be cold, but at least I'm honourable. I decided to feed you and house you and I kept my promise. And I did more than that – it suits you to forget it now. But I did dandle you and tell you stories. I kept you safe as I promised I would. I taught you all my skills, all my power. From your earliest days I let you watch everything, learn everything. There's always been a wise woman on the moor, and you were to be the wise woman after me.

'But you were too clever to be wise. You had to find your own destiny, and so you promised to love your mother and her God forever; but at the first hint of danger you ran like a deer. You ran from her, back to me; and then you ran from her God, back to magic again. You're a woman of no loyalty, Alys. It's whatever will serve a purpose for you.'

Alys had turned away and was looking out of the window where the sun was coming through the snow-clouds, hard and bright. Morach noted her hands on the stone window-sill, clenched until the knuckles showed white. 'I am not very old,' she said, her voice shaking. 'I am not yet seventeen. I would not run again. I have learned some things since the fire. I would not run now. I have learned.'

'Learned what?' Morach demanded. 'I have learned that it would have been better for me to have died with her than to live with her death on my conscience,' Alys said. She turned back to the room and Morach saw that her face was drenched in tears. 'I thought that as long as I survived, that was all that mattered,' she said. 'Now I know that the price I paid for my escape is high, too high. It would have been better for me to have died beside her.'

Morach nodded. 'Because you are now alone,' she said.

'Very, very alone,' Alys repeated. 'And still in danger,' Morach confirmed. 'Mortal danger, every day,' Alys said. 'And deeply enmeshed in sin,' Morach finished with satisfaction.

Alys nodded. 'I am beyond forgiveness,' she said. 'I can never confess. I can never do penance. I am beyond the pale of heaven.'

Morach chuckled. 'My daughter after all,' she said, as if Alys' despair was the stuff of rich comedy. 'My daughter in every detail.'

Alys thought for a moment and then nodded. The bowing of her head was an acceptance of defeat.

Morach nodded. 'You may be a wise woman yet,' she said slowly. 'You have to watch everything go. You have to see everything slip away from you, before you can be wise enough to do without.'

Alys shrugged sullenly. 'I have Hugo,' she said stubbornly. 'I have his promise. I am not a poor old witch on the moor just yet.'

Morach gleamed at her. 'Oh yes,' she said. 'I was forgetting that you have Hugo. What joy!'

Alys released the grip of her hands. 'It is a joy,' she said defiantly.

Morach grinned. 'Did I not say so?' she demanded. She laughed. 'So then! When do I see her? Catherine. When do I see her?'

'You call her Lady Catherine,' Alys warned. 'We can go and see her now, I suppose. She's sewing in the gallery. But watch what you say, Morach. Not one word of magic or she will have us both. She no longer fears me as a rival, but she would not resist the temptation to get rid of me, if you gave her the evidence to put me through another ordeal.'

Morach nodded, the old slyness back in her eyes above the green shawl. 'I don't forget,' she said. 'I'm not bought with a whore's gown. I'll keep my silence until I'm ready to speak.'

Alys nodded and opened the door. The women were sitting at the far end of the gallery with the yellow wintry sun shining through the arrow-slits on their work. They all turned and stared as Alys led Morach into the room.

'Anyway,' Morach said behind her hand, 'it wasn't me that used the magic dolls was it, Alys?'

Alys shot Morach one furious glance and walked forward. 'Lady Catherine,' she said. 'May I present to you my kinswoman, Morach.'

Lady Catherine looked up from her sewing. 'Ah, the cunning woman,' she said. 'Morach of Bowes Moor. I thank you for coming.' Morach nodded. 'No thanks are due to me,' she said. Lady Catherine smiled at the compliment. 'Because I didn't choose to come,' Morach said baldly. 'They rode up to my cottage and snatched me out of my garden. They said it was done on your orders. So am I free to go if I wish?'

Catherine was taken aback. 'I don't… ' she started. 'Well… But, Morach, most women would be glad to come to the castle and live with my ladies and eat well, and sleep in a bed.'

Morach gleamed under the thatch of grey hair. 'I'm not "most women", my lady,' she said with satisfaction. 'I am not like most women at all. So I thank you to tell me: am I free to come and go as I please?'

Alys drew breath to interrupt, but then hesitated. Morach could take what chances she wished, she had clearly decided to haggle with Lady Catherine. Alys chose to avoid the conflict. She left Morach standing alone in the centre of the room and went to sit beside Eliza and looked at her embroidery.

'Of course you are free,' Lady Catherine said. 'But I require your help. I have no mother or family near to advise me. Everyone tells me you are the best cunning woman in all the country for childbirth and cursing. Is that true?'

'Not the cursing,' Morach said briskly. 'That's just slander and poison-talk. I do no curses or spells. But I am a healer and I can deliver a baby quicker than most.'

'Will you deliver mine?' Lady Catherine asked. 'When he is born in October? Will you promise to deliver me a healthy son in October?'

Morach grinned. 'If you conceived a healthy son in January, I can deliver him in October,' she said. 'Otherwise… probably not.'

Lady Catherine leaned forward. 'I'm certain I have conceived a son,' she said. 'Can you tell? Can you assure me? Alys said it was a boy, can you see for sure? Can you tell if he is healthy?'

Morach nodded but stayed where she was. 'I can tell if it is a boy or girl,' she said. 'And later on I can tell if it is lying right.'

Lady Catherine beckoned her closer. 'If I want to,' Morach said unhelpfully. 'I can tell the sex of a child – if I want to.'

There was a ripple of subdued shock among the women. Ruth glanced over at Alys to see how fearful she was of her kinswoman's temerity. Alys' face was serene. She knew Morach always drove a hard bargain with a customer and Lady Catherine's private score with Alys could not be worsened.

'Alys, tell your kinswoman to watch her tongue or I will have her thrown to the castle dogs,' Lady Catherine said, her voice sharp with warning.

Alys raised her head from Eliza's embroidery and smiled at Lady Catherine without fear. 'I cannot command her, my lady,' she said. 'She will say and do as she pleases. If you dislike her you should send her home, there are many wise women in the country. Morach is nothing special.'

Morach cocked an eyebrow at the barb but said nothing.

Lady Catherine hunched her shoulders in irritation. 'What do you want then?' she asked Morach. 'What d'you want, to tell the sex of the child, to minister to me in the months of waiting, and deliver me a boy?'

'A shilling a month,' Morach said, ticking off her requirements on her fingers. 'All the ale and food I want. And the right to go in and out of the castle without any hindrance or question, day and night.'

Lady Catherine chuckled reluctantly. 'You're an old huckster,' she said. 'I hope you deliver babies as well as you bargain.'

Morach gave her a slow dark smile. 'And a donkey, so I can get to my cottage and back again when I need,' she added.

Lady Catherine nodded. 'Do we have an agreement?' Morach asked. 'Yes,' Lady Catherine said.

Morach stepped forward, spat in her hand and held it out to shake. Ruth, who was sitting at Catherine's feet, shrank back as if from an infection, but to Alys' surprise Lady Catherine leaned forward and took Morach's hand in a firm grip.

'Funny old lady, your kinswoman,' Eliza said under her breath

'She's an old hag,' Alys said, stirred with a sudden unreasonable irritation. 'I wish she had never come.'

'My lord was asking for you, Alys,' Lady Catherine said, scarcely troubling herself to glance over. 'Lord Hugh is in his chamber. He has some clerk's work for you.'

Alys rose to her feet and curtsied. She glanced over towards Morach. The old woman was the only idle one in the room. All of them, even Lady Catherine, had needlework or a distaff in their hands. She winked at Alys and hitched a footstool a little nearer the blazing fire.

'Your kinswoman will do well with us,' Lady Catherine said. 'I have some plain sewing which you can do, Morach.'

Morach smiled at her. 'I don't sew, my lady,' she said pleasantly.

There was another ripple of subdued shock among the women but Lady Catherine looked amused. 'Will you sit idle, with empty hands then? While all of us work?' she asked.

Morach nodded. 'I am here to watch over you and the child,' she said grandly. 'I need to be able to see -with my healer's vision. If you want some fool -' she smiled impartially at the busy women ' – some fool to net you a cap, there are many of them. There is only one of me.'

Catherine laughed. Alys did not even smile. She curtsied to Catherine and went from the room. Only when she was in the round tower climbing the little turret staircase to Lord Hugh's bedchamber did she realize that her jaw had been set with irritation and it ached.

Lord Hugh was seated at a table, a thin, densely written piece of paper unfurled before him.

'Alys!' he said as she came in. 'I need you to read this. It's written small. I cannot see it.' 'From London?' Alys asked.

The old lord nodded. 'The bird brought it to me,' he said. 'My homing pigeons. Clever little birds, through all this bad weather. It must be urgent for my man to send them out into snow. What does it say?'

The letter was from one of Lord Hugh's informants at court. It was unsigned, with a code of numbers to represent the King, the Queen, Cromwell and the other lords. Lord Hugh had his own methods for making sure that his sovereign sprang no surprises on his loyal vassals.

Alys read it through and then glanced up at Lord Hugh. 'Grave news,' she said. Hugh nodded. 'Tell me.'

'He says the Queen was taken to her bed. She was with child, a boy child, and he is lost.'

'Oho,' Lord Hugh said softly. 'That's bad for her.' Alys scanned the paper. 'Sir Edward Seymour is to become a member of the privy chamber.' She glanced at Lord Hugh. He was nodding, looking at the fire.

'The Queen blames the miscarriage on a shock from His Majesty's fall,' Alys read. 'But there is one who says that he heard the King say that God will not give him male children with the Queen.' 'That's it then,' Lord Hugh said with finality. Alys looked up at him questioningly. 'That's it for the Queen,' he said, speaking low. 'It will be another divorce I suppose. Or naming her as a concubine and returning to Rome. He's a widower now that Catherine is dead.'

'He could return to the Pope?' Alys asked incredulously.

'Maybe,' Lord Hugh said softly. 'Queen Anne is on the order of her going, that is for certain. Miscarriage, blame…' he broke off.

'He could restore the priests to their power?' Alys asked.

Lord Hugh glanced at Alys and laughed shortly. 'Aye,' he said. 'There might be a safe nunnery for you yet, Alys. What d'you think of that?'

Alys shook her head in bewilderment. 'I don't know,' she said. 'I don't know what to think. It's so sudden!'

Lord Hugh gave his short laugh. 'Aye,' he said. 'You have to skip very fast to keep pace with the King's conscience. This marriage is now against the will of heaven too, it seems. And Seymour's star is rising.'

He nodded towards a leather pouch of letters. 'These came by messenger,' he said. 'Scan them and see if there is anything I should know.'

Alys broke the seal on the first. It was written plainly in English and dated in January.

'From your cousin, Charles,' she said. 'He says there are to be new laws against beggary,' Alys read.

Lord Hugh nodded. 'Skip that bit,' he said. 'You can tell me later.'

'It is the coldest winter ever known,' Alys read. 'The Thames is frozen and the barges cannot be used. The watermen are suffering much hardship, starving for lack of work. Some of them have their boats stuck fast in the ice and the boats are being crushed. There is talk of a winter fair.'

Lord Hugh waved a hand. 'Read me that later,' he said. 'Anything which affects the north? Any new taxes?'

Alys shook her head. 'He speaks of the King's accident, a fall while jousting.'

'I knew of it already. Anything else?' 'He suggests that you write pressing your claim for the monastery lands which abut your manors,' Alys said. She could feel her lips framing each word precisely as she thought of the wide fertile fields either side of the river. Mother Hildebrande used to like to walk in the meadows before haymaking, smelling the heady scent of the flowers growing wild and thick among the grass. On a summer evening their perfume stole across the river to the gardens, to the chambers, even to the chapel, like a sweet, natural incense. Now these lands were spoil – up for offer.

'He says, "You and Hugo are well praised for the goods you have sent south and for your loyal zeal. Now is the time to prompt the King to reward your labour. He is also open to money bids for the land, beneficial leases, or land exchanges. They are saying that a lease of three lives will pay for itself over and over."'

The old lord nodded. Twenty-one-year leases,' he said softly. He shook his head. 'It would see me out, but what of Hugo? Anything else?'

Alys turned the page. 'Prices of corn, coal and beef,' she said. 'Prices of furs and wine.'

'Anything else about the north?' Lord Hugh asked. 'No,' Alys replied. 'But the laws about vagrants will affect your lands.'

They were silent for a moment, the old lord looking deep into the fire as if he would see his way clear through the changes which were coming.

'This other letter,' he said abruptly. 'Translate it for me. It's from the bishop's clerk and he writes in Latin. Read me it in English.'

Alys took the paper and drew up her stool to the table. It was a letter from the bishop's clerk outlining the acceptable causes and reasons for an annulment of the marriage between Lady Catherine and Lord Hugo. Alys felt the sudden heat come into her face. She looked up at the old lord. He was looking at her quizzically.

'I can send the old shrew away,' he said. 'Barren old shrew. Send her away and free Hugo.' A wide smile as bright as his son's cracked his grave face. 'I've done it!' he said. 'I've freed Hugo. Now he'll have a plump new wife with a fat new dowry and I shall live long enough to see my heir!' Alys' face was sour. 'You don't know then?' 'Know what?' he asked, his face darkening. 'Out with it, girl, you're my source for women's tattle. You should come to me with whatever news you have the moment you get it.'

'She's with child,' Alys said. 'I suppose that changes everything.'

For a moment he hardly heard her, then his face lit up with joy. 'With child!' His fist banged down on the forgotten, redundant letter. 'With child at last!' He threw back his head and laughed. Alys watched him, her mouth pressed tight.

'With child at last!' he said again. Then he checked himself. 'Is she sure? Have you looked at her? This is no ruse, is it, Alys? Does she think to save her skin for another few months with pretences?'

Alys shook her head. 'She's pregnant. I checked her. And she sent for my kinswoman, Morach, who is to stay with us until the birth. They've just struck their deal.'

'Boy or girl?' the old man asked eagerly. 'Tell me, Alys. What d'you think? Boy or girl?' 'I think it's a boy,' Alys said unwillingly. 'Has she told Hugo?' the old lord demanded. 'Curse the lad! Where is he?'

'She told him,' Alys said. 'He's out hunting venison for you, my lord. I don't know if he's back yet.'

'He went out without telling me?' the old lord asked, his face suddenly darkening. 'He gets the shrew in pup and then he goes out without telling me?'

Alys said nothing, her hands clasped in her lap and her eyes down.

'Hah!' Lord Hugh said. 'Not best pleased, was he?' Alys said nothing.

'She told him this morning and he went straight out?' Lord Hugh checked. Alys nodded.

'In a rage I suppose,' the old lord said ruminatively. 'He was counting on an annulment. He'll know that's not possible now.' The fire crackled. The old lord sat silent in thought. 'Family comes first,' he said finally. 'Duty comes first. He can take his pleasures elsewhere – as he always has done. But now that his wife is with child, she is his wife forever. The child is well – d'you think?'

'These are early days,' Alys said. Her lips were cold and the words came out carefully. 'Queen Anne herself can tell you that many a baby is lost before birth. But as far as I can tell, the child is well.' 'And a boy?' the old man pressed her. Alys nodded.

'That is well!' he said. 'Very well. Queen Anne or no! This is the nearest to an heir that we have ever come. Tell Catherine to wear something pretty tonight, I will drink her health before them all. She can come to my room as soon as she is dressed. I will take a glass with her.'

Alys nodded. 'And me, my lord?' she asked. 'These other letters?'

Lord Hugh waved her away. 'You can go,' he said. 'I have no need of you now.'

Alys rose from the chair, curtsied and went to the door. 'Wait!' he said abruptly. Alys paused.

'Thrust those papers from the bishop in the fire,' he said. 'We don't want to risk Catherine seeing them. She would be distressed. We cannot risk her distress. Burn them, Alys, there will be no annulment now!'

Alys stepped forward and gathered the thick manuscripts into her hands. She pushed them into the back of the fire and watched them flame and blacken and crumble. She found that she was staring at the fire, her face blank and hard.

'You can go,' the old lord said softly. Alys dropped him a curtsey and went out, closing the door softly behind her. David the dwarf was coming up the stairs, his sharp little face curious.

'You look drab, Alys,' he remarked. 'Are you sick? Or heartbroken? What's the old woman doing in the ladies' chamber? Are you not glad to have your kinswoman take your place?'

Alys turned her head aside and went down the stairs without answering.

'Is it true?' David called after her. 'Is it true what the women are whispering? Lady Catherine is in child and Hugo is in love with her, and she is high in the lord's favour again?'

Alys paused on the turret stair and looked back up at him, her pale face luminous in the gloom. 'Yes,' she said simply. 'All of my wishes have been fulfilled. What a blessing.'

'Amen,' said David, his face creasing into ironic laughter. 'And you so joyful!'

'Yes,' Alys said sourly, and went on downstairs.

Hugo was late from hunting and came to the high table when they were eating their meats. He apologized gracefully to his father and kissed Catherine's hand. They had great sport, he told them. They had killed nine bucks. They were hanging in the meat larder now and the antlers would be brought in for Lord Hugh. The hides, tanned, perfumed and soft, would make a cradle, a new cradle for the new Lord Hugo.

He did not once look at Alys, and she kept her gaze on her plate and ate little. Around her the babble of excited women's talk swayed and eddied like a billowy sea. Morach was silent too – eating her way through dish after dish with determined concentration.

When supper was over both Hugo and the old lord came to the ladies' chamber and the women played and sang for them and Catherine sewed as she talked. Her colour was high, she was wearing a new gown of cream with a rose-pink overskirt and a rose stomacher, slashed, with the cream gown pulled through. In the candlelight with her hair newly washed and dressed and her face animated with happiness she looked younger, prettier. The old bony greedy look had gone. Alys watched her glow under Hugo's attention, heard her quick laughter at the old lord's jests, and hated her.

'I need to pick some herbs in the moonlight,' she said quietly. 'I must ask you to excuse me, my lords, my lady.'

Catherine's bright face turned towards her. 'Of course,' she said dismissively. 'You may go.'

The old lord nodded his permission. Hugo was dealing cards and did not look up. Alys went down the stairs and across the hall, out through the great hall doors and into the yard of the inner manse and then turned to her right to walk between the vegetable- and herb-beds.

She needed nothing, but it was good to be out of the hot chamber and under the icy high sky. She stood for minutes in the moonlight, holding her cape tight around her, her hood up over her head. Then she walked slowly the length of the garden and back again. She was not planning. She was not thinking. She was beyond thought and plans or even spells. She was hugging to her heart the great ache of loneliness and disappointment and loss. Hugo would remain married to Catherine, they would have a son. He would be the Lord one day and Catherine the Lady of the castle. And Alys would be always the barely tolerated healer, clerk and hanger-on. Disliked by Catherine, forgotten by Hugo, retained on a small pension from the old lord because in that large household one mouth more or less made little difference.

She could marry – marry a soldier or a farmer and leave the castle for her own little cottage. Then she would work from sunrise until hours after dark, bear one child after another, every year until she fell sick and then died.

Alys shook her head as she walked. The little hovel on Bowes Moor had not been enough for her, the abbey had been a refuge she thought would stand forever, the castle had been a step on her way, and her sudden unexpected desire for Hugo and his love for her had been a gift and a joy she had not anticipated. And now it was gone.

Behind her the hall door opened and Hugo came out.

'I can't stay long,' he said in greeting. He took her cold hands in his warm ones and held them gently. 'Don't grieve,' he said. 'Things will come out.'

Alys' white, strained face looked up at him. 'Hardly,' she said acidly. 'Don't comfort me with nonsense, Hugo, I am not a child.'

He recoiled slightly. 'Alys, have a heart,' he said. 'We both thought that you would be safer here if Catherine were with child. Now she is content and her position assured and you and I can be together.'

'In secret,' Alys said bitterly. 'In doorways, here in the kitchen garden in darkness, wary of watchers.'

Hugo shrugged. 'Who cares?' he demanded. 'I love you, Alys, and I want you. I have done my duty by Catherine, she will ask no more. I will get you a house in the town if you wish, and spend my nights there with you. We can be lovers at least! I want you, Alys, I care for nothing but that!'

Alys pulled her hands away and tucked them under her cloak. 'I wanted to be your wife,' she said stubbornly. 'Your father had a letter from the Prince Bishop today telling how an annulment could be done. We were very near to being rid of her. I wanted her gone. I wanted to lie with you in the Lady's chamber, not in some little house in town.'

Hugo took her by the shoulders and shook her gently. 'Careful, my Alys,' he said warningly. 'You are sounding to me like a woman who wants to leap to the top of the ladder. I would have taken you for love, I desire you in my bed. I would lie with you in a ditch, on the herbs here and now. Is it me you want or my name?'

For a moment Alys held herself stiff, then she moved into his arms. 'You,' she said. He held her tight and the coldness and the pain in her belly melted in a great rush of desire. 'You,' she said again.

'We'll find some way,' Hugo said gently. 'Don't be so afraid, Alys. We will find ways to be together, and we will love each other. Don't fret.'

Alys, held warm and close inside his cloak, rested her head against his shoulder and said: 'If she were to die…'

Hugo was instantly still. 'If she were to die…' Alys said again. He held her away from him and scanned her face, her blue innocent eyes. 'It would be a tragedy,' he said firmly. 'Don't think that I would welcome that route away from her, Alys. Don't make the mistake of thinking I would permit it. It is not a strange thought to me, I admit. I have wished her dead many and many a time. But I would never do it, Alys. And the man or woman who hurt Catherine would be my enemy for life. I have hated her -but she is my wife. She is Lady Catherine of Castleton. I owe her my protection. I command you, I demand that you keep her as well and as happy as it is in your power to do. She is a woman like you, Alys. Full of desire and longing like you, like any. She may be greedy, and she and I may lie together in all manner of perverse ways. But she is not a bad woman. She does not deserve death. I will not consider it. And she is trusting in your care.' Alys nodded.

'Do you swear to protect her?' Hugo asked. Alys met his intent gaze. 'I swear it,' she said easily. She felt the arid taste of the empty oath in her mouth.

'I must go,' Hugo said. 'They will be watching for me. Meet me tomorrow, Alys, come to the stables in the morning, my hunter is sick, you can look at him for me and we can be together.' He kissed her gently, quickly, on the mouth and then he turned and was gone. She heard the hall door slam as he went inside, leaving her alone in the garden.

'If she died… ' Alys said softly to the moonlit garden in the icy light. 'If she died he would marry me.'