Chapter Eleven

Will watched his wife as she answered their questions, and was distantly amazed that he was not more furious. After all, this was a gift to his rivals, a ruinous waste of hard-earned advantage and resources, the kind of humiliation he had spent his life preventing – all caused by her careless, pious nonsense.

Yet he found the anger could wait. He let it simmer, unattended, while he watched her lie so smoothly to the bishop's face.

When questioned as to where she had obtained the writings, her answer was prompt but conveniently vague. A nameless pilgrim outside the cathedral at Hereford, she said with a helpless shrug. And while the frustrated bishop accepted this explanation, Will could not. He could not fully accept any of it. For every answer she gave, he found a reason to doubt her.

He could recognize an eagerness in himself – that he almost wanted her to lie, that he relished the idea that she might be deceiving them all. It seemed a vain hope – farcical, even, as she stood there with a vapid look, responding to nearly every query with pleas of ignorance and lamentations over her feeble woman's mind. "I want only to please God," she fairly whimpered over and over again, turning damp and pleading eyes on the assembled clergy.

She was either unforgivably weak and stupid, or she was playing with them all. He could not quite decide which it was. But he knew which he wanted it to be.

Only one certain truth could be found here, and it fascinated him: even if she was all obedience and regret now, still she had acted out of a willful defiance. She had. There was no denying that. She had used her mind, decided that the Church's teachings were not as important as her own thoughts, and spread heretical ideas. Out of her own conviction.

It was like discovering that her plain, drab dress was lined in crimson silk. It was intriguing. More than a little thrilling. Far more interesting, at the moment, than anger.

The churchmen discussed for some time, evening turning into night as they drove toward their inevitable verdict. Will listened to them, certain that he could have easily stopped all this or at least known it was coming, had he been at court. That it happened without warning, that it was organized and unhesitating, spoke of powerful adversaries with dark intent. The accusation against Lady Constance had obviously been intended to harm Ruardean – to harm him – and they only became more determined to cry heresy when they saw it was his wife who could be put on trial. So many deplorable things in these writings, they insisted with an eager outrage, the worst of which was a repeated questioning of the pope's infallibility.

They did not even bother to protest that the pope was infallible, these men so holy. And never mind that the papacy was in utter disarray, no pope named for two years now – a strange circumstance for so perfect a mortal. The facts were immaterial; the sin was in daring to voice the doubt.

Eventually, after Will had made his impatience known, they got on with it and pronounced her guilty. At least he had managed this, that it was quick and private and finished in a day. He was not surprised at the verdict, nor did she seem to be. Her face turned ashen at the words, but she did not protest it, or weep or grow faint. She only stayed silent and waited while the talk turned to the means of her redemption.

After Stowell had enumerated the months of her required fasting and prayer, he stood again – the better to look down on her.

"This penance is given for the good of your soul, Lady Margaret, and it will yet want a public renunciation of your heresy to repair the grievous damage it has done," he declared. "If there be other sins for which you seek redemption, Father Anselm will reckon them in your full confession."

"You want yet more confessing?" asked Will, who did not like to think of what she might feel obliged to confess about the sins committed in their marriage bed. "Do you hope to discover enough that I will endow more than one abbey?"

He kept his eyes on Stowell, though he would dearly love to observe Margaret in this moment. It was a reasonable enough price for an immortal soul, yet he could sense her dismay.

"An abbey," repeated the bishop, considering.

"In exchange for plenary indulgence," Will suggested. To buy a full pardon was the best solution, and if he was generous enough it could buy him support for his other ambitions. In truth, it was a sound investment. "Or if there be some other offering that is more pleasing–"

"An almshouse!" Margaret spoke from where she had fallen on her knees before them both. "My lords, the almshouse lately built in the Welshry here in Ruardean has granted much relief to the poor and infirm. I would show my contrition and amplify the goodness of God by building many more to serve His people, all along the route from here to Rome."

"Let us not be hasty." Stowell's expression had soured at this suggestion. "A large and well-appointed abbey is no less pleasing to God."

And infinitely more pleasing to Stowell's vanity, obviously, though William refrained from saying so. Instead, he offered, "Two almshouses, on the route of pilgrimage to Canterbury – and new windows of stained glass for the transept of your cathedral."

"Three almshouses," countered Stowell. "And a great round window of many colors above the altar in addition to the transept windows. We can accept no less to atone for so grave a sin."

Will considered this, working hard to conceal his pleasure in the bargaining. Of her prescribed penance, he most disliked the lengthy fasting, sure that Margaret would adhere strictly to the dietary restrictions. "Not two years, but a half-year of fasting should be sufficient when added to these."

"It may be acceptable to Rome," Stowell admitted with a manufactured reluctance. "I will recommend it."

At this, she rose from her knees very suddenly.

"I will go to the chapel now, that I may spend this night in prayer beseeching God to send His light and truth into my soul." Her head was bowed, her fingers clasped so tightly together that the knuckles were bone white.

Will stared at her hands, struggling to hide his surprise. If he had not felt her disgust so many times, he would not have recognized it now. Contempt was everywhere on her, laced between her taut fingers, escaping her with every exhalation. The meek posture was an illusion, and a stunningly effective one. Others would see a loathing that was righteously aimed at her own sinful self, but he could see – with a sudden and blinding certainty – that her disgust was for him. For the bishop, too, and for all these men of the Church who judged her.

Stowell granted her leave and instructed two of his priests to accompany her. Will could only watch her quiet exit and wonder what was truly in her mind.

After that, he spent some moments negotiating with the bishop on the matter of a public renunciation. Despite his best efforts, he could not avoid the demand that she send out a statement of formal repudiation. It must be unequivocal, signed by her own hand, and completed within a year.

And to fully repair the damage, the bishop insisted, William must do his part. There was no other way.

"Henry." Will entered his nephew's chamber little more than an hour later, bidding the other squires who shared the room to stay while Henry joined him in the corridor. "As a boy you were wont to study the Welsh language and speak it as well as any native. Do you yet possess the skill?"

Henry's eyes brightened. "Aye, Uncle Will, both the dialect of this region as spoken by my mother, and that of my grandmother's land in the north."

William wondered if his mother even knew that her grandson had done so much only to please her, and pushed away the embarrassment that he himself had never mastered the tongue.

"At dawn we begin a journey into Wales," he said, "to speak to various priests. I trust none better than you to give my words to them."

The pride in Henry's face was overtaken by shock and consternation as Will told him of Margaret's heresy. On hearing the news that they would speak to certain Welsh priests to learn how far the heretical teachings had traveled, and to condemn them at every turn, the boy nodded and earnestly said, "Gladly will I work to correct so malignant an influence."

"This is not only a matter of the Church," Will explained to his nephew, who must be made to understand the greater danger. "Our king would not have the Welsh think themselves bound to different laws and customs than the English, nor let them join together in their defiance, for these are the seeds of rebellion. Wales is fertile ground for such seed, and we must stop its spread lest there be another bloody uprising."

Henry nodded, assured of the gravity of the task, and promised he would be ready in the morning.

Just as dawn was breaking, after a night spent in preparation for the journey, Will went to the chapel. His lady wife was still there, on her knees before the cross. She was an unmoving figure in a nondescript gown, watched over by the bishop's men as if she could not be trusted to pray, though she was the very picture of docile obedience.

When they had married her father had been ill, within weeks of dying. He had written to Will with gratitude and blessings – all very standard sentiments except for one sentence so fervent that it seemed to shout at him from the page: I am conscious of the burden of my lineage, and trust in your ardent protection of my beloved daughter, now your lady wife, from any of its evil effects .

No one could read it without imagining what the man had endured in escaping the siege of Montségur. Just a child, barely past the age of reason, raised in a heretic faith and forced to flee while hundreds of his fellows burned on a pyre for their convictions. Surely he had instructed his daughter to be vigilant, never even to hint at questioning the teachings of the Church.

Yet she did question them. And she had not been able to resist acting on her doubts.

Behind him there was a muffled disturbance, the sound of someone trying to gain admission to the chapel and being denied. He turned and, squinting against the new daylight just above the horizon, perceived that it was Lady Constance. One of Stowell's men had stopped her and now was instructing a member of the guard to take her to the solar and keep her there.

Will approached them, amazed to see that the man actually dared to hold Lady Constance at the elbow in a firm grip. He stared pointedly at the broad hand until it released her, then asked, "Wherefore do you dare to hold a lady and member of this household by force?"

"She is to be questioned, my lord," answered the man. "By order of the bishop."

Lady Constance spoke very calmly, as though none of this surprised or worried her. "Gladly will I answer what questions ye may have, when my morning prayer is done."

The bishop's man stepped close to Will and spoke quietly, so as not to be overheard.

"She is to be questioned ere she speaks with Lady Margaret, so we may discover if that lady did truly act alone, as she has sworn."

Will stared a moment at this effrontery, then spoke his answer just as quietly.

"If you will dare to insult my lady wife and call her liar again, then will you learn what it is to have Ruardean as enemy." He waited, satisfied with the way the man's eyes widened in fear, the tiny step backwards he took, until a stammering response began to emerge. Will cut across it, abandoning the hushed tone. "The truth is easily proven without you question this lady. Come."

He would not deign to accommodate this if he were not curious himself. But he too wanted answers, and it was simple enough to arrange.

A forbearing Lady Constance was brought to the small chamber behind the hall. Will bade her wait there, asking her pardon for it. He sent one of the guards to bring Margaret to the room where she would greet her friend in privacy, and then ushered the bishop's man around a corner and halfway down a staircase.

"We will watch them unseen. If there is aught more to learn of their dealings, you will hear it now."

It was an expedient ruse, one he had used many times – though never before on his wife. Perhaps they would learn the sin was all Lady Constance's, and Margaret would be exonerated. Or perhaps they would hear something that only made matters worse, and he would have to paint every inch of the cathedral in gold and silver. "Make no noise," he advised the bishop's man, idly wondering how difficult he might be to bribe.

He carefully moved aside the empty torch brackets to reveal two spy holes in the wall, a secret known only to his nearest family. It allowed them to look into the room where Constance sat with hands folded. She prayed with a fervor, eyes closed as she whispered her devotions, until the moment the door opened and admitted Margaret.

They watched Constance stand, and Margaret fall to her knees in supplication.

"Dearest friend!" she cried as she reached out and grasped Constance's hands. "I beg you will let me speak without interruption, so that you may hear all my offenses against you."

And so they watched while she told an amazed Constance that the papers she had carried were full of vile teachings, that the bishop had learned of it, and that Margaret had unwittingly spread heretical ideas. She cursed her own foul pride and lamented that her actions had caused her friend to fall under suspicion. She begged forgiveness for having concealed so much from Constance.

All the while, William observed, and wondered.

Her hands gripped too tightly, too urgently. Her tender remorse seemed at odds with the hard look in her eye as she gazed at her friend. Her words were spoken in the familiar meek tone and not the more assured voice that he had lately learned she possessed in moments of true conviction.

But perhaps he only saw what he wanted.

Certainly Lady Constance reacted with horror. She cried, "Why? Wherefore would you risk yourself in this way?" She was bewildered, angry, desperate to understand. "I have promised to serve you in good faith, and never have I faltered – yet you betray all that?"

William watched his wife plead, and her friend tearfully bite back angry words. There was nothing here that contradicted what Margaret had confessed. Nothing at all, down to the least detail. Even with no one but her most trusted friend to see, she was deeply repentant.

"If you will not despise me, Constance, come with me now," she finally said as she rose and moved toward the door. "I will pass the day in prayer, and would have you at my side as ever when I beg forgiveness for my many sins."

It was only at the last instant, and only because he watched Margaret so closely, that he saw it. A simple glance, a little pause as she exited. Her eyes passed over the spy-hole low on the wall, resting for a heartbeat on the place where he watched her. She could not see the darkened slit, cleverly disguised. But he held his breath anyway, watched as her glance slid away from his hiding place, and witnessed the split second that her lip curved in the barest hint of a smile. There was no mistaking it.

She knew she was watched. She knew. He was certain of it. This was all performance, and she was satisfied that she had played her part well.

When the door closed behind her, the bishop's man turned to him, clearly convinced that the Lady of Ruardean had not lied. William only nodded, holding on to the image of that sidelong glance, her faint but unmistakable air of triumph, the secret flash of color he now knew was real.