For once we might truly be a family, not an eclectic collection of individuals who existed under the banner of some phantom-like lord of the manor. With Gisborne in our midst, our shoulders seemed to straighten as if we at last had leadership and purpose.
Purpose?
No, that was wrong. The purpose had always been present – to survive when we knew we were being sought – William and I pawns in the game played by two knights. Was I incorrect when I called it a game? It was a question I longed to ask Gisborne. They call the struggle to live the Game of Life after all, those dusty philosophers who crackle like aged vellum as they wander the halls of Oxford, Paris, and Bologna. Do they know what it is like to be hunted? I’ll wager they do not.
Biddy served us as if we were all indeed nobles of the first order. Gisborne’s open purse strings had filled her market baskets to overflowing. She served white pottage made with leeks and almond meal and flavoured with borage and rocket. Aaron ate this happily and I blessed Bridget for remembering the needs of every one of us. She heaped fresh lobster on the table along with salty anchovies bought from the fishers whose little boats hugged the harbour walls and who shouted to attract the attention of any one interested in buying their catch. She fried the fish crisp and coated in a bittersweet orange sauce, claiming that the stallholder selling the oranges had robbed her blind. She laid down fresh lagana in place of bread, with olive oil tossed through. Olive oil seemed to grease the wheels of life in this part of the world and I had begun to enjoy the taste of our bread dipped in oil and then salt.
When complimented on her food, Biddy blushed saying, ‘It were them Romans who knew how to cook. Seems they knew a thing or two about food,’ and I wondered at her skill. Just once or twice some vendor would have explained in a tongue with which she was hardly familiar on how she must cook her purchases. Such knowledge seemed to find a readily accessed niche within her mind and yet my dearest Bridget could not even write nor read.
Life is a funny thing.
We interspersed the savoury with dates and some more of the oranges that had disturbed Biddy’s equilibrium, some currants and sultanas and we celebrated our contentment with Ligurian wine – a simple meal but one that marked our new existence. Neither Norman nor Anglo Saxon. Bridget called it Roman but the Genoese were becoming possessive of their identity.
I sat back and watched our table, William asleep in my arms. Peter and Gwenny sat feeding each other orange segments, Peter paring the skin to tiny strips with his knife and Biddy urging him not to lose a single piece because she could use it in the kitchen.
Gisborne and his men talked about serious matters – about the last of the Capetian fleet that cluttered the waters of Genoa, temperamental men who if they hadn’t made their promise to God, would have left Richard to fry in the fat of his own foolishness on account of their Countess Alys of Vexin.
Once, as Peter and Gwen told Biddy a humorous story with much laughter from the trio, I noticed the voices at the other end of the table had lowered and that Gisborne alone was speaking quietly, the light of the cressets hitting the angles of his face as all eyes watched his finger drawing a map in the debris of our meal.
Ulric looked up and caught me watching and for a moment it was as if he didn’t know how to respond, but then he smiled – a gentle expression that had carried me through so much in the last year. Gisborne turned slightly and intercepted our bond of comradeship and I could almost see him assessing its strength and in one of those strange moments in time where one can notice everything, Ulric’s eyes dropped, his smile tucked away, Gisborne’s hands tightened and he reached across to my cheek, stroking gently, asking,
‘Tired?’
I was livid.
What right had he to that proprietorial tone? How dare he push Ulric apart in that way?
