“ ’Twas a long time ago,” Lady Chandra said finally. “And of no importance at all now.”
“Jerval, Chandra, how long do you remain in London?” Graelam asked.
“Another week or so,” Jerval said. “Chandra has accepted a challenge from Edward on the archery range. I fear I am relegated to the role of holding her quiver.”
“ ’Twill be an alarming contest,” Graelam said. “I will bear you company and the two of us will cheer her on.” He turned to his wife. “Come, Kassia, ‘tis time you met your king.”
“Lady Chandra will go against the king?” Kassia asked, disbelief so clear in her voice that Graelam laughed.
“Indeed,” he said. “Chandra is a warrior.”
“But she is so beautiful!”
“I learned with her that the one only enhances the other. She is a woman who holds honor dear. And at last it appears that she holds her womanhood dear as well.”
The tone of his voice altered slightly, and Kassia frowned down at her blue leather slippers. She remembered him telling her that a lady had given him the scar on his shoulder. Chandra? she wondered. Had he loved her? Did he still love her? At the very least, she thought miserably, he much admired her. She is everything I am not. I would not know the end of an arrow from its beginning.
They entered a line of no
bles that would pass in front of the newly crowned King Edward and Queen Eleanor. Kassia smiled, curtsying to a Sir John de Vescy, another noble who had been with Graelam in the Holy Land.
Thank the Lord for the coolness of the October day, Kassia thought, for with the press of people, heat would have made it unbearable.
She moved closer to her husband, comparing him to the other noblemen. He looks as magnificent as a king, she thought, as he threw back his black head and laughed aloud at a comment from a gaunt-looking man with bushy black eyebrows. His robe was of rich gold velvet, full-cut, its flowing sleeves lined with ermine. About his waist was a thick black belt from which hung a slender gem-studded sword. The robe fit across his massive shoulders perfectly. She had sewed many hours to make it thus.
“Ah, my lord Graelam!”
Graelam bowed deeply. “Sire, welcome home! Your throne has grown dusty in your absence, and your barons morose without a king to complain about!”
“Aye,” the king said, smiling widely, “but I venture you have told them enough stories to blacken my reputation! My love, here is the Wolf of Cornwall to greet you!”
Queen Eleanor gasped with pleasure. “Graelam! So many friends come to see us! You look more handsome than my poor lord, Graelam! I fear foreign lands have added gray to his hair!”
“But who is this, my lord?” Edward said, his penetrating blue eyes going to the small woman at Graelam’s side.
“Allow me to present my wife, sire, Kassia de Moreton.”
“My lady,” Edward said smoothly, and took her small hand into his large one.
“Sire,” Kassia said, curtsying. She blurted out, “You are so tall! I had believed my lord the largest of men, yet you can see over his head!”
Eleanor laughed. “He has oft told me that he grew to such a height to better intimidate all his nobles. My lord’s uncle, the Duke of Cornwall, has told us of you, Kassia. So romantic and dramatic a story. We will speak, for I wish to hear all about you and your taming of the Wolf of Cornwall.”
Taming! Ha, Kassia thought as she walked beside her husband to greet other acquaintances.
The afternoon faded into evening and by the time the great banquet was served, Kassia felt herself trembling with weariness. She toyed with the vast variety of foods, sampling only the delicious stuffed pheasants and the creamed potatoes. The wine, she was certain, came from Aquitaine.
“The queen is very gracious,” she said to Graelam when he turned away from conversation with Lord John de Valance.
“Aye,” Graelam said. “ ’Tis the only love match amongst royalty I have heard of Eleanor saved Edward’s life in the Holy Land when he was attacked by an assassin with a poisoned dagger.”
“She killed the assassin?” Kassia asked, her eyes wide.
“Nay, Edward killed the man and collapsed. She sucked the poison from his arm. I was not present, but Jerval and Chandra were. Edward’s physicians were supposedly furious at the queen’s interference.”
She toyed for a moment with her goblet. “You knew Lady Chandra before she wed Sir Jerval?”
Graelam studied her averted profile. “Aye,” he said shortly.