“Talk to your daughter,” he said to his wife.
Both women sat in silence as the earl exited from the room. Then Nell turned white-faced to her mother. “I don’t want to get married so soon, Mama! I don’t know anything about men. I have scarcely left the convent.”
Lady Alice leaned over and patted Nell’s clasped hands. “I know, my dear. But your father is set upon this great dynastic match and he won’t risk something happening to stop it. There is nothing I can say or do that will make him change his mind.”
Nell started to tremble all over. “I still feel a stranger at Bardney, and I have you and Aunt Alida. It will be terrible going to another castle, where I won’t know anyone.”
“Girls do it all the time, my dear. Perhaps Alida would go to stay with you for a few months.”
Nell didn’t say anything, she just continued to tremble.
“Sybilla was looking forward to this marriage,” Alice said brightly. “You will be a very great lady, Nell. You will have brought Lincoln, with all its castles and manors, into your husband’s keeping. He will reverence you for that.”
This can’t be happening, Nell thought with terror. She looked imploringly at her mother. “I’m just not ready for this, Mama,” she whispered.
Lady Alice came to sit on the arm of Nell’s chair and hugged her. “I will help you get ready,” she promised. “And, Nell, you must know it was very painful for me to send my little girl off to the convent. If I hadn’t thought that it was God’s will I could never have done it. And I missed you. Sybilla and Geoffrey could never fill the gap that you left.”
Nell turned her head and looked into her mother’s eyes. “Is that true?”
“Yes.”
“You used to come to visit me, but then you stopped.”
“Your father thought that I should leave you to the convent and not keep reasserting other ties. I could see that you were happy where you were, so I left you to immerse yourself in convent life. It was hard for me to do that, Nell. You may not believe that, but it was. Just as it was hard for me to send Geoffrey to be a squire in the Earl of Hertford’s castle. But that is the fate of a mother. You will find that out for yourself one day. We bear children, we love them, and then we must send them away to be brought up by other people. That is the way of the world, my dear. There is no use in railing against it.”
Nell thought it sounded like a dismal life. The convent, with its structured life, its warm, continuing friendships, was much more desirable.
“I don’t think I like the world, Mama,” she said in a little voice.
Her mother smiled. “You know nothing about the world, my dear. It may not be as safe as your convent, but it is brimming with life and love. Open yourself to life, Nell. Embrace it. Don’t look backwards. Don’t be afraid. Your future is an adventure where you might find happiness you never dreamed of. Give it a chance. Will you do that for me, sweeting?”
They’re making me marry a stranger, they’re sending me away again, and they want me to be happy?
Nell stared at her lap and didn’t answer.
Lady Alice started toward the door and after a moment Nell followed. I don’t want to get married, she thought desperately. I don’t want to get married.
But it was clear that her thoughts and feelings were of no matter to her father. It would serve him right if I died, too, she thought.
She fought back tears as she went with her mother down the stairs to the Great Hall. In her mind she turned for solace to the only friend she had. Dear God, she prayed, if it is your will that I marry this man, please give me the courage to face what must be faced. I beg you to help me, Father. I don’t know how I will be able to get through this alone.
Five
For Nell, the time until the date set for her marriage went by far too quickly. Every morning she woke up thinking, I’m another day closer to my wedding. And her stomach would churn and wouldn’t stop churning until she finally fell asleep again at night. She had no appetite and she lost weight, to the dismay of the ladies who were altering Sybilla’s clothes to fit her.
“You must eat,” her mother scolded her one afternoon as they sat at the table for dinner.
Nell looked at the food on her plate and her stomach heaved. “I’m not hungry, Mama,” she said.
Her mother said worriedly, “You didn’t have any weight to spare when you first arrived here, and this refusal to eat is making you look like the daughter of a poverty-stricken house.”
The earl, who had been in conversation with his chaplain, turned his head. “What is the matter here?” he asked his wife.
Lady Alice hesitated, then she said, “Nell is not eating properly, my lord. She grows too thin.”
The earl frowned at Nell. “What is the matter with you? The food at Bardney is of the best.”
“The food here is wonderful, Father,” Nell said quickly. “It’s just that I am not hungry.”
“If you are fasting, I am here to tell you that this is not the time. You are not a religious any longer, Nell. You are my daughter and I want you to eat.”
He turned to the chaplain. “Tell her, Father, that it is not appropriate for her to fast.”
Before the priest could speak, Nell said quickly, “I’m not fasting, Father. I’m just not hungry.”
“I don’t care if you are hungry or not. You will eat,” the earl said.
Nell’s stomach heaved at the thought. “I don’t think I can,” she said.
“Nonsense.” The earl scowled at her. “Pick up a piece of pork and eat it.”
Nell picked up the pork with her fingers. She looked at her mother. “It won’t harm you,” Lady Alice said. “Go ahead and eat it.”
Nell put the meat into her mouth. She chewed twice. Her stomach heaved and she shoved back her bench, got up and ran for the stairs. She threw up in the rushes before she was halfway there.
She heard her father curse.
Nell wrapped her arms around herself and stayed where she was. She had never felt so humiliated in her entire life. She had vomited in front of everyone! She shuddered and squeezed her eyes shut so she wouldn’t have to look at the disgusting mess on the floor.
“It’s all right, Nell.” It was Aunt Alida’s voice close to her shoulder. “Martin will have someone clean it up. Come along with me and we’ll go upstairs.”
“You will both stay right here.” It was her father’s voice. “Nell may have gotten away with such behavior in the convent, but it won’t work here. If she doesn’t want to eat, that’s her choice. But she will sit with her family at dinner regardless of what she eats herself.”
Aunt Alida took her hand and squeezed it gently. “Come and have something to drink,” she said in a low voice. “Your mouth must taste terrible.”
I hate him, Nell thought. He doesn’t care about me at all. All he cares about is getting the earldom of Wiltshire.
She dropped her head so she would not have to look at anyone and let her aunt turn her and lead her back to the table.
The wedding party arrived at Bardney two afternoons before the wedding was to take place. Nell was in the ladies’ solar when a page came to inform them of her bridegroom’s arrival and to summon Lady Alice and Nell to the Great Hall. Nell was already dressed in her new finery, a fine white linen undertunic with embroidery at the cuffs and neck, and over it a dark blue overtunic,