Winter Song by Roberta Gellis Page A

accustomed to being the chatelaine of the estate to a
greater degree than most women because her first husband had been indifferent
to the lands except as a source of income.
    Now that Elizabeth had married Alys’s father, both women would
have needed to live in the same keep. It was right that Elizabeth should manage
her husband’s house, yet how could Alys step back? The servants came to her out
of habit. She answered their questions out of habit. Elizabeth was sweet and
mild of temper, but eventually she would begin to resent this. However, if she
put out her hand to take the reins of the household, Alys would not be able to
keep from resenting that.
    William understood this as well as Elizabeth. The only
solution would have been to separate the women, but then he would have been
torn apart between them. If he stayed with Elizabeth, which his heart and body
demanded, his conscience would tell him that his daughter was deserted and
lonely. He could never be easy or comfortable. Guilt would nag and drag at him.
It was this knowledge that made it possible for William to accept his daughter’s
marriage with gladness.
    Because William was happy, so was Richard of Cornwall. He
was delighted with the marriage for political reasons, but would have been
distressed if his old friend had been grieved. The other guests, some of
William’s neighbors but mostly Richard of Cornwall’s vassals, were also happy.
The neighbors were glad to see Alys so well wedded and so obviously in love
with her future husband. Cornwall’s vassals were pleased to meet in an informal
and joyful atmosphere the man they would need to obey in the earl’s name, to
whom they would render accounts and submit petitions.
    All in all it was a marvelous wedding. The weather was not
yet cold enough to imprison everyone inside Wallingford, so hunts and outside
entertainments, even a small tournament, were arranged. The grains and
vegetables had not yet been so long in storage as to grow musty. The cattle,
pigs, and deer were still fat from summer feeding and autumn gleaning so that
meats were sweet and succulent, but best of all, everyone was in so good a
humor from adequate exercise and mental content that no drunken brawls broke
out during the entire week it took the guests to gather from all over Richard
of Cornwall’s domain.
    During that week, Alys and Raymond hardly exchanged a single
word with each other. Alys and Elizabeth were busy arranging sleeping quarters
and table positions so that no one would be offended, and Raymond was as deeply
involved in entertaining the gentlemen. The situation was strangely exciting to
both—the brief meeting of eyes across the hall, an even briefer touch of
fingers on hand or arm or shoulder seemed to arouse more sexual tension between
Alys and Raymond than an intimate kiss. Raymond found himself with a heat and
pressure in his loins that made him curse the binding of his chausses and bless
the looseness of his surcoat. Alys could not put a name to what she felt. Her
skin was strangely tingly, and her breasts were so sensitive that she could
feel every movement of her shift against her nipples. When Raymond touched her,
even as a partner in a public dance, she felt hot and cold and so shy that she
could not meet his eyes.
    It was ridiculous to feel shy with Raymond, Alys told herself
over and over. She had not forgotten how she had laughed at him, scolded him,
instructed him when he first came to serve her father. Tell herself, she could;
change her feelings, she could not. Each time Raymond spoke to her, she blushed
and dropped her eyes, which nearly melted him with tenderness, even while it
excited him still further.
    By the morning of the wedding, both were quivering with eagerness
and tension. Raymond’s anxieties were especially peaked by his
father-by-marriage. William had begun to glare and snap at him as he realized
that only hours remained before his daughter was made a wife and completely
removed from his