Age of Gods and Mortals Read online

  The entire fourth floor of Snow Hill’s keep was the lord’s great chamber. Addison had built it for his wife, Mira, but she had only been able to enjoy it for two years before her death. He followed her shortly thereafter. Now it was the chamber for the second Lord Dorstone, Addison’s eldest son, and for his wife. It was a room often filled with love and laughter, and therein lay the problem. Emotions that should have never been part of the matrimony contract made today’s circumstance cut to the bone.

  Like a bizarre standoff, Teague d’Mearc stood near the door of the chamber while his wife stood on the opposite side of the room. Tresta’s lovely face was drawn and pale as she clutched the sling-back chair for support. She was having difficulty facing her husband. There was silence, and there was palpable pain.

  Teague broke the stillness.

  “Dearest, I know how you feel, but I have already delayed long enough as it is,” he said. “Will you see me off or must my last memory of you be here, weeping and ill?”

  Tresta didn’t know how to answer her husband. It would have been far easier to collapse at his feet and beg him not to go, but she knew in her heart that it would be to no avail. Besides, she had already tried. Teague was set on going, as was his brother, and as was Tresta’s own brother. Men with valiant dreams of victory and no concept of the heartache they would leave behind. She knew it would be the last time she saw any of them and the grief was too much for her to bear.

  “Damn Richard!” She avoided his question, going off on yet another rant. “The man spends all of his time in France and when he issues the call to arms, he expects the whole of England to rush to his aid. What is he but an in absentia ruler, hated by the known world and reviled by his own brother? His own father tried to kill him and you yourself fought against the very king who now calls you to arms. Do you not see the irony in this? Why do you all rally to this man as if he is a god to be worshipped and blindly served?”

  They had given this conversation its due course, too many times. Teague calmly gazed at his wife, studying the features that he had fallen in love with those many years ago. She had such a beautiful face, with hazel eyes and round cheeks and a delicious mouth that could unfold into the most radiant smile. Flashes filled his brain of a shapely girl with long, copper-colored hair, working in the marketplace with her father. He remembered the first time their eyes met. He remembered everything; a powerful, bittersweet recollection that threatened to weaken his stance.

  But no. He could not weaken.

  He sighed heavily and moved towards her.

  “He is our king.” He had lost count of the number of times he had explained this. “Jerusalem has fallen to the infidels. Richard has issued a call for every noble of faith to attend him in his quest to regain the city of Christ. Though he has spent a good deal of time in France, he is nonetheless England’s king and we are bound by oath to do his bidding. If he is questing to the Holy Land, then I must go. You know this.”

  She shook her head so hard that the hair gathered at the nape of her neck shook free and lashed at her cheeks. Her emotions were in turmoil and her health, so fragile, was unavoidably affected. She began to cough the wet cough that had plagued her ever since contracting a chest cold the previous year. Sometimes it was so bad that she couldn’t breathe. The physic couldn’t explain it away and the lady couldn’t shake it. Teague was, and had ever been, deeply concerned for her health, but he was a selfish man. He knew his decision to join the king for his great quest would upset her. He knew it and he did it, anyway.

  No amount of emotional upheaval, or ill health, was going to change his mind.

  “Calm yourself,” he said softly. “Slow your breathing.”

  Tresta ignored his advice, struggling with the spasms. “I do not want you to go, Teague,” she said. “Though in my mind I know that you must, my heart cannot let you leave. When you go… surely, I cannot go on.”

  He reached her then and his arms went around her. “Aye, you will,” he murmured into her hair. “You will administer Snow Hill in my absence and give me every reason to be proud of you. I will return to you, Tressie, I swear it. But if I do not…”

  She gasped, trying to pull away. “You promised you would!”

  He cut her off gently. “If I do not, then you will swear to me that you will live a life that honors me,” he said. “You will not be weak. You will not do anything foolish. You will be strong, as I know you can be. And if you have the opportunity for happiness again…”

  She yanked hard, breaking his grip. “You must not speak of such things!”

  He held up a quieting hand to her. “If you have the opportunity for happiness again, you will take it. I want you to be happy again.”

  Tresta had promised herself last night, after they’d said their intimate farewells, that she would be brave this day. Her oath dissolved as he spoke of her continuing on after his death. She hated him for saying such things, but she knew deep down that he was only speaking the truth. Such was their reality. She returned to his powerful arms and collapsed against his warm strength.

  “Teague, please,” she clung to him. “Please stay with me. I cannot bear to be without you. I cannot recall when I have ever been without you.”

  He forced her to look up at him, his big hands cupping her sweet face. He was trying very hard to be courageous, uncertain what the future held for the both of them.

  “Do you remember the day we first met?” he asked.

  Tresta’s mind drifted to the days when she had first lain eyes upon Sir Teague d’Mearc. She had been a child of sixteen years while he had been a man of twenty years and six. Though she had lived in the village of Snow Hill most of her life, she did not remember the eldest son of Addison d’Mearc. Teague had gone to foster at Kenilworth Castle at a young age and after that, he served the Earl of Lincoln. When he finally returned to the castle his father had built, it was with the airs of a conquering hero.

  Addison and Teague, and eventually the younger brother, Sheen, had fought for Henry II against the rebellion of his sons Richard, Geoffrey and John. Sheen had been a mediocre knight while Teague, a tall and powerful man, had shown Homeric potential.

  Tresta recollected when she first saw him; he had been in full armor, expensive and well-worn stuff, and she had seen little of his physical features other than his piercing brown eyes beneath his open face plate. She had been helping her father, a wealthy local merchant, set up his wares for the day. Teague had come up behind her on his massive warhorse and never left her side. She had tried to shake him, fearful of his size and attention, but he would not be moved. The man was like a rock. Nothing she could say would sway him, not even when her poor brave brother, Hallam, took to throwing stones at him.

  It had taken a full day before she had ever seen the man behind the armor. When he finally revealed his true self, she had been in for a surprise. Never in her life had she seen a more ruggedly handsome creature. Teague did not cut his hair in the Norman fashion; it fell in exquisite light brown curls past his shoulders. It was the first thing she noticed, fascinated that a civilized man should wear his hair as a barbarian. Then she had observed the intense brown eyes and jaw of granite. Though he was a man of very few words, it took little time for her see past the physical appearance to the man of quick humor and wisdom beyond.

  They had married a scant month later. She was right when she said she had never been without him; ten years and four sons later, they were a part of each other as surely as the moon was a part of the night sky.

  But in that familiarity was dependency, mostly hers.

  “I remember,” she murmured after a moment’s reflection. “I remember how arrogant you were, newly returned from Henry’s wars. I remember that you would not leave me alone.”

  He ran his fingers through her silken hair, feeling the same hint of a thrill as the very first time he had done so. There was nothing about this woman that did not thrill him, but he had to admit that over the years, the thrill had dimmed a little. There
was more comfort there than anything else.

  “I swore the moment I saw you that you would never be out of my sight,” he said softly. “I am more sorry than you can imagine that I must break that vow.”

  Her hands moved over his face imploringly, hating that she sounded so weak. “Take me with you.”

  “I cannot.”

  “But…!”

  “We have been down this path too many times. You know that I cannot take you. I will not take you. The boys need…”

  “Sebastian and Gabriel are fostering at Chepstow Castle,” she said quickly. “They are well looked after.”

  He grasped her chin gently. “But Jasper and Rhys are not. They are four and five years of age and require their mother, especially in their father’s absence. You would deprive them of both parents?”

  Guilt flickered in her expression. “I love my boys more than my own life. How can you question my devotion to them? Do you think it is easy or simple to suggest my separation from them?”

  He kissed her deeply, quelling any storm that may be rising as a result of their foray into this delicate subject. “I have never seen a more devoted or loving mother,” he whispered. “I know how careful you are with them, how concerned, and how utterly dedicated you are to their welfare. Your abilities as a parent are not in question. But you are speaking out of desperation now. Even if I could take you with me, how do you think the little ones would react to both of their parents leaving?”

  Tears came anew as she thought of her youngest children, two little blonds with their father’s piercing brown eyes. If Teague was her heart, then surely her children were her soul. She could not do without either.

  “They will have my father to look after them,” she said, hating herself as she did so. It sounded so self-serving. “They will be safe here at Snow Hill, well cared for and looked after. They do not need me. But you do.”

  “I do?”

  “You’ve not done without me for ten years. I do not think it wise to upset the balance.”

  He smiled at her. “I am forced to agree that I certainly cannot do without you given the choice. But in this matter, I do not have a choice. I must go, and you must stay. The children need you more than I do and I do not want to worry about you on the long journey to The Levant. Distraction, in my vocation, can be deadly.”

  The Levant. The Latin Orient. How many times had Tresta heard that term, having come to despise it? She began to feel defeat creeping into her veins, unable to shake the sensation.

  “Is there nothing I can say?” she whispered. “Must I let you leave this place knowing that I may never see you again?”

  He stroked her hair, kissing her again, remembering their long night of passion when neither one of the slept, afraid to relinquish one moment for fear it might never come again.

  “I love you more deeply with each breath I take,” he murmured against her lips. He tasted her tears and felt her muffled sobs against him. “Nay, you must be strong. Please be strong. I do not want the boys to see you so upset. And I do not want my last memory of you to be with tears streaming down your face. Leave me with your beautiful smile to remember, always.”

  She couldn’t stop weeping, though she was desperately trying. “This moment will never come again,” she whispered. “This time, where we stand in this chamber with wonderful memories of our life together, will never come again. These days of bliss are gone.”

  He felt her desperation but could not succumb to it. Grasping her firmly by the arms, he forced her to look at him. “I cannot know what the future holds for us,” he said with quiet firmness. “But I do know that I will do everything in my power to return whole and victorious to you. I swear to God, my thoughts from this day until the moment I return will be only of you and our children. Memories of you will give me the strength I need to succeed.”

  She wiped her face, struggling to quiet. Gazing into those eyes she knew so well one last time, she brought forth a weak smile. “I know you will. And I am sorry to be such a fool.”

  He kissed her forehead. “You are not a fool. Had I any less self-control, I would be blubbering like an idiot myself.”

  She grinned, continuing to wipe her cheeks dry as she gently pulled herself from his grasp. She went to the wardrobe and opened the massive doors, digging about inside. Teague watched her pull out a small satin pouch, embroidered with layers of precise stitching. Tresta opened the purse, looking at her husband shyly.

  “I have been saving this,” she said. “Though I’ve never been through this personally, I know that it is customary for a lady to give her knight a favor by which to remember her. Therefore, I wanted you to take something of me with you, something that would remind you of me every time you held it.”

  He walked over to her. “What is it?”

  She pulled out a small figure from the pouch, a stuffed poppet no more than five inches in length. Teague immediately recognized the fabric the poppet was made from; it had been his wife’s blue silk wedding gown. Long, silky tufts of copper-colored hair were stitched to the top of the poppet’s head. When it dawned on him that he was looking at his wife’s cut hair on the head of the poppet, he reached out and released the pin that held back her hair. He ran his fingers through the length of it, almost in panic, looking for the section she had cut.

  “Tresta,” he murmured. “You cut some of your hair. Where…?”

  She flipped her head over, showing him the nape of her neck. “Here,” she showed him. “’Twas no more than five or six inches from underneath my head. No one will ever see it.”

  He could see where she had cut it and she was correct; he’d never noticed. She handed him the poppet, like an offering, and he inspected it with a measure of uncertainty. He wasn’t sure he could, as a man, carry around a toy, no matter what the sentimental value. But his uncertainty was dissolved as he smelled the faint scent of violets. He inhaled of the doll deeply. It smelled as his wife did. As he held it to his nose, she reached up and pulled up the little dress, exposing the belly of the poppet.

  He could see something embroidered on the body.

  “Remember me,” he murmured, looking up at her. “Remember me.”

  She smiled timidly. “You may be gone a very long time,” she said. “I want you to remember me.”

  He grew serious. “As if I could forget,” he said, stroking her cheek. “I shall keep it against my heart, always.”

  “Promise?”

  “I swear upon my oath.”

  There was little left to say. Tresta took the poppet back, put it in the pouch, and handed him the sealed purse. He took it in one hand and pulled her to him with the other. They gazed into each other’s eyes for an eternity of wordless moments. Tresta could feel his heartbeat mingling with hers and she absorbed the sensation, praying it would not be her last.

  “The men are waiting in the bailey,” she murmured.

  He kissed her several times over, delicately, with more emotion than passion. He was tasting her one last time, allowing himself to feel the pain of separation that he had been putting off until now. At this moment, he could no longer deny it.

  “Let us say our farewells then,” his voice was hoarse with emotion. “The children will be waiting to see me off. They believe this is some grand adventure I am going on and I wish to keep it that way. They do not understand the pain of separation yet.”

  A final heated kiss passed between them. Teague led his wife down the narrow stairs of the keep and out into the bailey, the violet-scented doll clutched against his breaking heart.

  Remember me.

  He could do nothing else.

  CHAPTER TWO

  London, England

  Ports along the Thames

  London was a major seafaring port, exporting wool to Europe and importing precious items such as wine and fine fabric. Regulations were strict, though there was no Customs House to enforce them. A few officers of the royal house had to suffice to uphold the laws. On this fine day, the seabirds screamed
in the blue skies overhead, swooping upon the banks where the fishermen had left the guts and heads of the catches for the day. It was a feast.

  A hedgerow of dilapidated stores faced this segment of the River Thames where the cogs would pull up to the shoreline and drop anchor on the rocky shore. On the roof of a fishmonger’s shop, three small bodies clad in raggedy wool and leather lay upon their stomachs on the slanted rooftop overlooking the Thames. From their vantage point, they could clearly see the ships preparing to sail to King Richard’s service. The figure in the middle pointed to the largest ship on the shore. There was much activity surrounding it, like bees buzzing around a hive.

  “Is that the ship?”

  A blond head, topped with a ratted wool cap, nodded vigorously. “Aye, my lady,” the young boy replied. “Sir Hallam told me they were sailing on the king’s largest ship. Look at all of the knights loading their horses into the hold. It must be true.”

  Tresta’s eyes were fixed on the hectic scene below as she digested the information. There were sailors everywhere, most of them heading to the ships that lined the shore almost as far as the eye could see. The boat master stood at the top of the gangway, holding the manifest and signing on the men who would risk their lives for months at sea for a few pence a week. For some, it was the only life they knew. For others, it was the only way to make a living in deeply divided economic times. For the very young that signed on shipboard, it was a way to eat because their families could not support them.

  It was survival.

  Tresta had been in London for two long days. Her escorts were two pages from Snow Hill that she had coerced into coming with her – Simon of Pembury, whose father was a knight already in the king’s service, and Channing, Lord Ellington, of Ashtonlyne Castle in Yorkshire. The boys had come to foster at Snow Hill at six years of age; three years later, they were bright, resourceful boys attempting to gain favor with the knights to move on to a squire position. They had been easily pulled into the lady’s conspiracy because of the adventure in it. All young boys dreamed of battle and glory, and what the lady had in mind was exactly the sort of dreams they wanted to live. At no time did they consider the peril of it.