It was warming, that noise, because it was normal. It didn’t hide any mysterious dreams, or any—what? He couldn’t remember. The children shrieked, animals grunted, butted each other and any humans close enough. Chickens squawked as they pecked at the children’s bare toes, sending them running and yelling. Above it all was the armorer’s hammer, striking iron, making it ring and echo throughout the bailey.
The main thing was, the noise was all young.
Bishop breathed in the scents of baking bread, horse dung, human sweat, and fresh rosemary. He saw Philippa holding a basket in her hand, and in that basket was a pile of rosemary she’d just picked.
“Bishop. Welcome. Who’s this? Goodness, neither of you looks very good. What happened?”
Merryn could just imagine how they looked. Their clothes weren’t yet dry, but she knew her gown was wrinkled and torn, her hair whipped into tangles around her head.
She looked at Bishop, saw that he was smiling.
“It is good to be back to something I know and understand,” he said, “something that is utterly normal. Merryn, that bent little man is Crooky the Fool and the other is Gorkel the Hideous, well named indeed, a man endowed with the ugliest face in Christendom. And that is Eldwin, Dienwald’s master-at-arms, out of breath from running down the wooden stairs from the ramparts.”
Bishop looked down at Dienwald and Philippa. “This is the maid of Penwyth who’s been married four times. Merryn de Gay, this is Lord Dienwald de Fortenberry, earl of St. Erth. And this is Philippa, his wife and helpmeet, the king’s sweet daughter.”
Merryn had never before visited St. Erth. She’d heard stories about the Scourge of St. Erth, but he didn’t look at all wicked. And Philippa, the king’s bastard daughter, was beautiful, all that thick, curly hair, plaited through with pale yellow ribbons.
Dienwald laughed and clasped Merryn beneath her arms to lift her off Fearless’s back. “You’re just a bit damp, both of you. Why? Look at the sun overhead. You were sporting with her, weren’t you, Bishop, and you both fell into a river or perhaps a small pond somewhere?”
“Ah, Dienwald, no sporting around with her.” Bishop laughed, dismounted, and handed Fearless’s reins to Gorkel, who gave him a blinding smile. “Actually, it is raining hard on Penwyth land.”
“But not here?” Dienwald arched an eyebrow. “How is that possible, Bishop?”
Bishop could do nothing but shrug. “It is a bit unusual, I suppose. I cannot explain it.”
“Bishop made it rain,” Merryn said.
That brought instant and complete silence.
“No,” he said, all calm and indifferent, “I didn’t. She jests.”
Dienwald gave him an odd look, then stepped aside as his wife said, “We can have explanations later. Come in, come in. First, dry clothes for both of you. Ah, it is a very good thing that we have more than enough sheep now to weave wool for clothes. Merryn, you’re about my height, so my gowns should fit you well enough.”
“Ha,” Dienwald said. “You’re a giant, a maypole. This is but a little bit of a girl and—”
Philippa stuffed a bit of rosemary into her husband’s mouth. He spat it out, laughed, and said, “Come along, Bishop. Gorkel will take good care of Fearless. Indeed, he is the only one to take care of the brute, since he’s the only one Fearless won’t try to bite.”
“Aye, Fearless is afraid that Gorkel will bite him.”
Not long thereafter, Merryn walked beside Philippa de Fortenberry, countess of St. Erth, up the deeply worn stone steps into the great hall.
There was so much noise, everyone talking at once, everyone moving here and there, going about their tasks, half their attention on Bishop and Merryn. And the laughter and the sounds of children playing, shouting, arguing.
“At Penwyth,” she said to Philippa, “there isn’t this noise.”
Philippa raised an eyebrow at that. “Every keep I’ve visited shatters the eardrums, even the inner bailey at Windsor.”
“It’s all old men at Penwyth,” Merryn said. “They don’t usually speak loudly. Thank you for the clothes.”
“These lovely clothes were given to me by Kassia de Moreton some years ago. They fit you well enough. What do you mean there are only old men at Penwyth?”
They’d reached the great hall. “Oh, no,” Philippa said and rolled her eyes.
Crooky the Fool had hopped on top of one of the trestle tables. He sang at the top of his lungs:
“Here’s the king’s Bishop
Not here to play at chess.