Alys shook her head. 'She's pregnant. I checked her. And she sent for my kinswoman, Morach, who is to stay with us until the birth. They've just struck their deal.'

'Boy or girl?' the old man asked eagerly. 'Tell me, Alys. What d'you think? Boy or girl?' 'I think it's a boy,' Alys said unwillingly. 'Has she told Hugo?' the old lord demanded. 'Curse the lad! Where is he?'

'She told him,' Alys said. 'He's out hunting venison for you, my lord. I don't know if he's back yet.'

'He went out without telling me?' the old lord asked, his face suddenly darkening. 'He gets the shrew in pup and then he goes out without telling me?'

Alys said nothing, her hands clasped in her lap and her eyes down.

'Hah!' Lord Hugh said. 'Not best pleased, was he?' Alys said nothing.

'She told him this morning and he went straight out?' Lord Hugh checked. Alys nodded.

'In a rage I suppose,' the old lord said ruminatively. 'He was counting on an annulment. He'll know that's not possible now.' The fire crackled. The old lord sat silent in thought. 'Family comes first,' he said finally. 'Duty comes first. He can take his pleasures elsewhere – as he always has done. But now that his wife is with child, she is his wife forever. The child is well – d'you think?'

'These are early days,' Alys said. Her lips were cold and the words came out carefully. 'Queen Anne herself can tell you that many a baby is lost before birth. But as far as I can tell, the child is well.' 'And a boy?' the old man pressed her. Alys nodded.

'That is well!' he said. 'Very well. Queen Anne or no! This is the nearest to an heir that we have ever come. Tell Catherine to wear something pretty tonight, I will drink her health before them all. She can come to my room as soon as she is dressed. I will take a glass with her.'

Alys nodded. 'And me, my lord?' she asked. 'These other letters?'

Lord Hugh waved her away. 'You can go,' he said. 'I have no need of you now.'

Alys rose from the chair, curtsied and went to the door. 'Wait!' he said abruptly. Alys paused.

'Thrust those papers from the bishop in the fire,' he said. 'We don't want to risk Catherine seeing them. She would be distressed. We cannot risk her distress. Burn them, Alys, there will be no annulment now!'

Alys stepped forward and gathered the thick manuscripts into her hands. She pushed them into the back of the fire and watched them flame and blacken and crumble. She found that she was staring at the fire, her face blank and hard.

'You can go,' the old lord said softly. Alys dropped him a curtsey and went out, closing the door softly behind her. David the dwarf was coming up the stairs, his sharp little face curious.

'You look drab, Alys,' he remarked. 'Are you sick? Or heartbroken? What's the old woman doing in the ladies' chamber? Are you not glad to have your kinswoman take your place?'

Alys turned her head aside and went down the stairs without answering.

'Is it true?' David called after her. 'Is it true what the women are whispering? Lady Catherine is in child and Hugo is in love with her, and she is high in the lord's favour again?'

Alys paused on the turret stair and looked back up at him, her pale face luminous in the gloom. 'Yes,' she said simply. 'All of my wishes have been fulfilled. What a blessing.'

'Amen,' said David, his face creasing into ironic laughter. 'And you so joyful!'

'Yes,' Alys said sourly, and went on downstairs.

Hugo was late from hunting and came to the high table when they were eating their meats. He apologized gracefully to his father and kissed Catherine's hand. They had great sport, he told them. They had killed nine bucks. They were hanging in the meat larder now and the antlers would be brought in for Lord Hugh. The hides, tanned, perfumed and soft, would make a cradle, a new cradle for the new Lord Hugo.

He did not once look at Alys, and she kept her gaze on her plate and ate little. Around her the babble of excited women's talk swayed and eddied like a billowy sea. Morach was silent too – eating her way through dish after dish with determined concentration.

When supper was over both Hugo and the old lord came to the ladies' chamber and the women played and sang for them and Catherine sewed as she talked. Her colour was high, she was wearing a new gown of cream with a rose-pink overskirt and a rose stomacher, slashed, with the cream gown pulled through. In the candlelight with her hair newly washed and dressed and her face animated with happiness she looked younger, prettier. The old bony greedy look had gone. Alys watched her glow under Hugo's attention, heard her quick laughter at the old lord's jests, and hated her.

'I need to pick some herbs in the moonlight,' she said quietly. 'I must ask you to excuse me, my lords, my lady.'

Catherine's bright face turned towards her. 'Of course,' she said dismissively. 'You may go.'

The old lord nodded his permission. Hugo was dealing cards and did not look up. Alys went down the stairs and across the hall, out through the great hall doors and into the yard of the inner manse and then turned to her right to walk between the vegetable- and herb-beds.

She needed nothing, but it was good to be out of the hot chamber and under the icy high sky. She stood for minutes in the moonlight, holding her cape tight around her, her hood up over her head. Then she walked slowly the length of the garden and back again. She was not planning. She was not thinking. She was beyond thought and plans or even spells. She was hugging to her heart the great ache of loneliness and disappointment and loss. Hugo would remain married to Catherine, they would have a son. He would be the Lord one day and Catherine the Lady of the castle. And Alys would be always the barely tolerated healer, clerk and hanger-on. Disliked by Catherine, forgotten by Hugo, retained on a small pension from the old lord because in that large household one mouth more or less made little difference.

She could marry – marry a soldier or a farmer and leave the castle for her own little cottage. Then she would work from sunrise until hours after dark, bear one child after another, every year until she fell sick and then died.

Alys shook her head as she walked. The little hovel on Bowes Moor had not been enough for her, the abbey had been a refuge she thought would stand forever, the castle had been a step on her way, and her sudden unexpected desire for Hugo and his love for her had been a gift and a joy she had not anticipated. And now it was gone.

Behind her the hall door opened and Hugo came out.

'I can't stay long,' he said in greeting. He took her cold hands in his warm ones and held them gently. 'Don't grieve,' he said. 'Things will come out.'

Alys' white, strained face looked up at him. 'Hardly,' she said acidly. 'Don't comfort me with nonsense, Hugo, I am not a child.'

He recoiled slightly. 'Alys, have a heart,' he said. 'We both thought that you would be safer here if Catherine were with child. Now she is content and her position assured and you and I can be together.'

'In secret,' Alys said bitterly. 'In doorways, here in the kitchen garden in darkness, wary of watchers.'

Hugo shrugged. 'Who cares?' he demanded. 'I love you, Alys, and I want you. I have done my duty by Catherine, she will ask no more. I will get you a house in the town if you wish, and spend my nights there with you. We can be lovers at least! I want you, Alys, I care for nothing but that!'

Alys pulled her hands away and tucked them under her cloak. 'I wanted to be your wife,' she said stubbornly. 'Your father had a letter from the Prince Bishop today telling how an annulment could be done. We were very near to being rid of her. I wanted her gone. I wanted to lie with you in the Lady's chamber, not in some little house in town.'

Hugo took her by the shoulders and shook her gently. 'Careful, my Alys,' he said warningly. 'You are sounding to me like a woman who wants to leap to the top of the ladder. I would have taken you for love, I desire you in my bed. I would lie with you in a ditch, on the herbs here and now. Is it me you want or my name?'

For a moment Alys held herself stiff, then she moved into his arms. 'You,' she said. He held her tight and the coldness and the pain in her belly melted in a great rush of desire. 'You,' she said again.

'We'll find some way,' Hugo said gently. 'Don't be so afraid, Alys. We will find ways to be together, and we will love each other. Don't fret.'

Alys, held warm and close inside his cloak, rested her head against his shoulder and said: 'If she were to die…'

Hugo was instantly still. 'If she were to die…' Alys said again. He held her away from him and scanned her face, her blue innocent eyes. 'It would be a tragedy,' he said firmly. 'Don't think that I would welcome that route away from her, Alys. Don't make the mistake of thinking I would permit it. It is not a strange thought to me, I admit. I have wished her dead many and many a time. But I would never do it, Alys. And the man or woman who hurt Catherine would be my enemy for life. I have hated her -but she is my wife. She is Lady Catherine of Castleton. I owe her my protection. I command you, I demand that you keep her as well and as happy as it is in your power to do. She is a woman like you, Alys. Full of desire and longing like you, like any. She may be greedy, and she and I may lie together in all manner of perverse ways. But she is not a bad woman. She does not deserve death. I will not consider it. And she is trusting in your care.' Alys nodded.

'Do you swear to protect her?' Hugo asked. Alys met his intent gaze. 'I swear it,' she said easily. She felt the arid taste of the empty oath in her mouth.

'I must go,' Hugo said. 'They will be watching for me. Meet me tomorrow, Alys, come to the stables in the morning, my hunter is sick, you can look at him for me and we can be together.' He kissed her gently, quickly, on the mouth and then he turned and was gone. She heard the hall door slam as he went inside, leaving her alone in the garden.