She did not wait long. Lord Hugh jumped out of his sleep at the yell from the great hall which echoed up to his room.

'What is that? What is that?' he demanded. 'Alys! Are we under attack? What is that noise?'

'I'll go and see, my lord,' Alys said smoothly. She went to the door but as she opened it David came in. 'Nothing to alarm you, my lord,' he said swiftly. 'The Lady Catherine had a fall in the river and Lord Hugo has brought her safe home. She is being put to bed by her women. Her wise woman says she thinks the child is not hurt.' 'God be praised!' the old lord said, crossing himself.

'Tell her I'll come at once. Alys! D'you hear that! Catherine near-drowned and the heir with her! God's breath! That was a narrow escape!' 'I'd best go to her,' Alys said.

'Yes, yes. Go and see how she is and come straight back to me. I'll come and see her myself when she permits. And tell Hugo to come to me as soon as his wife is settled.'

Alys slipped from the room and ran down the stairs to the ladies' gallery. The place was in uproar. Servants were running around with wood-baskets, ewers of hot water, jugs of mulled wine and hot mead. Catherine's women were shrieking orders and then cancelling them, snatching up Catherine's hands to chafe and kiss. Hugo, supporting Catherine, was yelling for them to put a warming-pan in Catherine's bed and clear the room so she could be undressed. Morach, ignoring the hubbub, dripped a wet path to Alys' chamber. She checked when she saw Alys in the doorway and their eyes met.

'You swim like a witch,' Alys said, not caring who heard her.

'And you curse like one,' Morach replied, venom in her voice,

'Why meddle?' Alys asked, dropping her voice so her words were lost in the shouting. 'You heard my power, you know what I was doing. Why meddle in my work?'

Morach shrugged. 'That's a death I'd wish on no one,' she said. She shuddered as if she was chilled to her soul. 'I'd hate to die by water,' she said. 'I couldn't stand by and see a woman die by water. Not a young woman, not a young woman with child, not one that I'd served. You're a harder woman than me, Alys, if you could have stood by and watched her drown.'

'I was holding her under with all the power I have,' Alys said through her teeth.

'And I pulled her out,' Morach said, blazing. 'There are some deaths no woman should suffer. I'd rather any death than drowning. I'd rather any death in the world than going under the water and choking my way to hell.'

Alys glanced around her. Eliza Herring was within earshot, though screeching instructions to a servant. 'Thank God you were there,' Alys said loudly.

Morach gleamed under her dripping mat of grey hair. 'Thank you for your good wishes.' She pushed past Alys and went into their little room, slamming the door. Alys turned and clapped her hands together. 'You men!' she said, her voice clear above the noise, 'Out! All of you! We cannot get Lady Catherine abed with you all here. Eliza! Turn down her bed. You girl!' – to a passing maid – 'Get those warming-pans into her bed. And you' – to another – 'see the fires are banked high in her chamber and this one.'

The room emptied at once. 'Out of the way!' Alys said crossly to the maidservants and to Catherine's ladies who still cluttered the room. She took Catherine's other arm and she and Hugo led the shivering woman into her chamber and lowered her into a chair by the fire.

'Fetch towels and sheets,' Alys ordered Hugo, without looking at him. She pulled off Catherine's sodden fur cloak and dropped it on the floor. Then she unpinned her head-dress, undid her gown, and stripped her with hard hands until the woman was naked.

Hugo passed her the towels and both of them rubbed her hard all over until her white skin glowed pink and the roughness of the gooseflesh had subsided. Then Alys wrapped her tight in the warm sheets and Hugo lifted her into bed. Alys piled rugs on top of her and pulled the warming-pans out to refill them with fresh embers, while Hugo gave her hot mead to drink. Her teeth chattered pitifully on the cup. Alys, at the fireside, shovelling embers, hunched her shoulders. 'I'm cold,' Catherine said.

Hugo shot a despairing look at Alys. The room was as hot as a bread-oven. Alys' face was flushed, her forehead damp with sweat. The mud on Hugo's boots was dried to dust by the heat, his wet clothes were steaming.

'Drink some more mead,' Alys said, without turning round. She slammed the scorching lid of the warming-pan and then wrapped it in a towel and thrust it into the bed under Catherine's feet.

'I'm so cold, Alys,' Catherine said. Her voice was high and thin, like a child. 'I'm so cold, Alys. Can you not give me something to make me warm?'

Alys turned to the chest and pulled out one of Catherine's great fur cloaks with the hood. 'Sit up a little,' she said. 'We'll put this around you like a shawl, and you can have the hood over your wet hair. You'll soon warm up.'

Together they raised her in the bed. Alys looked away when her robe fell open and the rounded part of her belly was exposed. She looks like a mead-pot, Alys thought irritably, all gross curves. Beside the plump naked woman, Alys felt herself to be a shadow, a spectre of darkness. She tucked the thick furs around Catherine and then pulled the bedclothes up again.

'Warmer?' she asked.

Catherine nodded and tried to smile, but her face was still white. Hugo held her cold hands in his own. He turned them over, her fingernails were blue.

'Should she be blooded?' he asked Alys. 'Should we sent for a surgeon and bleed her?'

Alys shook her head. 'She needs all her blood,' she said. 'She's choleric in humour. She'll warm up.'

'And the baby?' he asked. He turned a little away from the bed so Alys could hear him, but Catherine could not. 'The baby is the most important thing. Will the baby be all right?'

Alys nodded. She had a very sour taste in her mouth. She did not want to put her face too close to Hugo, she thought her breath would smell foul. 'I doubt this will harm the baby,' she said. 'You will be laughing about this in a few days. Both of you.'

Hugo nodded but his face was dark with worry. 'Pray God that's so,' he said.

Alys turned away. 'I have to go to your father,' she said. 'He sent me to find news of Lady Catherine. Shall I send one of the other women in to sit with her?'

Hugo shook his head. 'I'll go to him,' he said. 'And I'll come back at once. You stay here and watch over her. I trust you to care for her, Alys. You know how much this child means to me. He will be my future -and my freedom. He will make my fortune this autumn if we can get him through to a safe birth and to his grandfather's arms.' Alys nodded. 'I know,' she said. Hugo turned back to the bed where Catherine lay, her arms wrapped around herself, shivering in the baking heat of the bedroom. 'I am going to tell my father that you are safe and well,' he said. 'I will leave Alys here to care for you, and I will come back in a few moments.'

Catherine nodded and lay back, her jaw clenched to keep her teeth from chattering. Against the dark furs her skin was white as thick vellum. The door shut quietly behind Hugo as he went out.

The two women were alone. The room was silent. In the gallery outside the bedroom door, Catherine's other women waited around the fire twittering like nervous birds. Catherine did not have the strength to call them, she could not reach out her hand to the bell. She was as much in Alys' power as if Alys had her bound and gagged and a knife whetted ready for her throat.

Alys turned from the door and came slowly to the foot of the bed. Catherine's pale brown eyes looked up at her.

'I felt as if I was pushed,' she said. Her lip trembled, like a little child that has suffered some unimaginable unkindness. 'I felt as if someone pushed me. But there was no one there.' Alys looked back at her, her face impassive. 'I heard a humming noise, a loud humming noise -like bees, or like a person humming – and then I felt someone push me, push me hard, push me into the water,' she said.

Alys' lovely face was clear, her blue eyes confident. 'These are fancies,' she said, her voice lilting, sweet as a song. 'You have had a grievous fright. Pregnant women have these fears, my lady. There was no one near you, my lady. How could anyone hum and throw you in the river?' She laughed gently.

Catherine put a hand out of the nest of furs towards Alys. 'Will you hold my hand, Alys?' she asked pitifully. 'I am afraid. I feel so afraid.'

Alys came a little closer. She could hear the humming in her own head now, like a drowsy hive. She knew that if she touched the smallest fingertip of Catherine's white cold hand she would succumb to temptation and snatch up the pillow and crush it down over her frightened face. The humming was too loud to resist. 'I have been cruel to you, Alys,' Catherine said, her voice a thin thread. 'I have treated you unkindly and tormented you. I was jealous.'

Alys kept her face blank, and held on to the noise of the humming. Louder and louder the noise swelled, while Catherine beckoned her closer.

'I am sorry,' Catherine said softly. 'Please forgive me, Alys. Hugo looked on you with such desire I could not bear it. Please forgive me.'

The humming was drowning out thought. Catherine was reaching out for her. Alys' hands trembled with the desire to lock around her fat neck and squeeze and squeeze until there was no breath left in that plump, white, indulged body.

'Please, Alys,' Catherine said pitifully. 'You do not know what it is to feel jealousy such as I felt for you. It led me into the sin of unkindness to you. I know I taunted you and tormented you. I am afraid I made an enemy of you. Forgive me, Alys. Please say you forgive me.'