“Aye, I have to as well.”
It was a beautiful morning, not as warm as it had been the day before. It was at that instant that he smelled the change in the air. It was always so. This shift in the very feel of the air itself. The sun was low on the horizon. It was still early. The sea was calm. He watched her walk to the one bush. He turned and relieved himself, thinking for the first time in his life that it was a much easier task for a man.
He saw to Fearless, who was bored and ready to butt Bishop’s shoulder with his great head. He rubbed him down, moved him to another place, this one closer to the cliff edge so he could see all the birds at play below.
When she came out from behind the bush, she sniffed the air as he had and smiled. “I’m quite hungry. Let me see what Dumas packed for us.”
He could but stare at her. Was this just a simple pleasant outing for her? She didn’t appear to be afraid of him at all. This wasn’t good.
He said, his voice all hard and rough, “Go through the supplies. Then after we eat, I will tell you what I’ve decided to do with you.”
That made her wary again, made her afraid, which she should be. He was getting used to the idea that he would marry her. Since he’d been told by every man he’d known that it was a wife’s duty and obligation before God to obey her husband, give him children that survived, and never disagree with him, he realized that she could pose something of a challenge. After all, she wanted to be the heir to Penwyth as much as he did.
Then, suddenly, he clearly saw a small boy in his mind’s eye, a boy whose hair was as black as his. Ah, but the boy’s eyes, they were green as the Boskednan swamp grass, not dark blue like his. This was nonsense. He wasn’t a damned seer. He wasn’t a wizard, either. He knew no secrets, no ancient truths that floated through the eras to come into the modern day, evidently still fully potent. No, he couldn’t conjure up a meal for himself, much less curse a man and make him keel over dead.
So where had that boy child come from? Likely from sleeping on the hard ground, a female sprawled on top of him. The result was painted images in his brain.
He knew only about rain, nothing more. He didn’t know much about females, either, just that to have a willing body beneath him made him feel very good for a number of hours after. Every man he’d ever known was just the same.
She said, “My grandmother whispered to me how you, with no hesitation at all, told her that she’d birthed five children. How did you know that?”
He took the piece of Beelzebub’s cheese she handed him and chewed on it, gaining himself some time. He shrugged, swallowed the cheese, and said, “I have told you. I am a wizard. I know things.”
“Or mayhap the king mentioned it to you.”
“How would the king know such a thing? Why would he care?”
That was true enough. She gave him a loaf of bread that she unwrapped from a cheese cloth, watched him break it apart in his big hands. She said, “My grandmother was frightened.”
“Good. She should be. However frightened she was, she still wouldn’t tell me anything of any use at all. She is a very strange lady, Merryn. Did she raise you?”
“Aye, she did raise me, I suppose you could say. More often than not, though, I simply did what I wished until our steward, Ranlief—”
“At least the steward got to sleep in his own chamber last night.”
“Aye, I’m sure he appreciated that. He says his bones pain him during the night. My grandfather had a special mattress made for him. It’s filled with feathers from chickens and geese. Ranlief was the one who taught me how to read a bit and to write. You said my grandmother was strange. I have always found her fascinating. She prides herself on her strangeness, her contrariness. It drives my grandfather quite mad, always has, and she knows it full well. But you know, I believe that he hit her only that one time, never again, not even after Meridian died.”
“What about your mother?”
“My own mother died shortly after she’d birthed her third son. All the boy babes died. Only I survived. My father, Sir Thomas, wasn’t often at Penwyth after my mother died. He didn’t seem to care anymore.”
“Your great-grandmother—Meridian. That is a very strange name. I’m very sorry about the boy babes, but to survive to manhood is difficult.”
“Aye, it is. I heard talk that I should have died, not the boys, but I didn’t.”
“Where did Meridian live?”
“In a castle near Tintagel. She knew things, just like you know things, and they happened. I’m not lying to you. Did the curse really come from her? Or through her? I don’t know. You see, I am telling you everything I know.” Then she fell silent, chewed on the bread he handed her, and he wondered if she were chewing over her lies as well, her secrets, damn her eyes. “I think if my great-grandfather did kill her it was because he was simply too frightened of her to let her live.”
The wind died. From one moment to the next, the wind simply stopped. The air seemed to thin, to flatten. It was a very strange thing, but Bishop felt it happen, deep inside him. He didn’t move, just let this strangeness seep into him.
Merryn said, “What is wrong, Bishop? Why do you look so strange?”
Suddenly Fearless whinnied.
Bishop jumped to his feet and looked around, but there was nothing—no one was anywhere near them. He’d picked this spot because he could immediately see anyone coming.
Nothing. Just the morning haze that stretched as far as he could see