Alred sat at his table, twirling a dagger over and over in his hands, watching the green light flash off the blade as it turned. He had work to do, but he had shut himself up in this room to prevent himself from doing any further damage this morning. He had snapped at Dunstan, he had yelled at Egelric, and he had insulted Alwy Hogge, who, so far as he knew, had gone off afterwards to cry.
He was worthless lately when it came to getting anything done. He had finally given Egelric full authority to make decisions for him in the weeks to come, knowing that Egelric was more capable of serving his interests than he himself was at the moment.
Matilda had been greatly affected by the death of little Witburga and the effect it had had on her friend the Countess. Alred had finally forbidden her to ride up to Bernwald; she was doing more harm to herself than good to Colburga, for Colburga could not be comforted.
And Matilda had taken to her room, and finally Matilda had taken to her bed, and she had not risen again these past five days. She had been strong and smiling as long as she could help Colburga, but once that need for courage had passed, she had rapidly declined. And now she lay again as she had before Gwynn came, pale and swollen, weak, and with a thirst that could not be quenched.
Only this time he blamed himself more. This time, this should not have happened.
It would have been a relief if Colburga could have come in and shrieked at him again; God knew he deserved it. But Colburga’s thoughts were far from him and his.
Nor was there Cenwulf to talk sense into him, for Cenwulf was trying to pull his wife out of the depths to which she had descended.
Nor was there even Sigefrith, he admitted. Sigefrith was still around, still came to visit him almost every day, but the Sigefrith he knew was hidden away from him, crouching wounded somewhere deep inside the man. The Sigefrith he saw was half-drunk at any hour of the day and sarcastic and rough.
And all because of that woman! That woman who thrived and prospered, so far as he knew, with another one of Malcolm’s brats in her belly, while his own darling lay near to death as his punishment for loving her too much. It was enough to make one wonder at the perversity of the God who arranged it all.
But he would not. It was all in His hands, it was all in His hands, he reminded himself.
They were putting the roof on the chapel now. They had had to put up a wooden wall behind the altar to block the enormous hole in the wall he had left for the great window he had planned, but the glazier who could do such amazing things with colored glass was hard at work glazing the windows in the tower room Sigefrith was making for That Woman. As if pretty windows could bring her back to his bed! It was too sickening.
But he intended to have the chapel closed off and usable before the birth of the baby, and so it seemed it would be. The decoration and the rest could wait, but he would pray there for her when the time came. Nothing else mattered for now.
A servant’s tapping at the door interrupted his thoughts. “Her Majesty the Queen is here to see Her Grace,” the man said hesitantly, clearly afraid to bother him, but knowing that it was more important that his wife not be bothered.
“The Queen!”
He had seen Maud but a few times, from afar, since he had stood in the corner and watched Colban recognize his own children in Maud’s baby’s face. Sigefrith had not admitted – perhaps did not yet know – that the baby was not his own, but it was clear that Maud herself made his life miserable enough even without that crowning insult.
And now she dared to show her face here, knowing that Matilda herself could not stomach the sight of her, though for different reasons!
“Send her here, rather,” he said to the servant. He pushed back his chair and rose – she was a woman, and so he must rise for her, but he would be damned if he bowed to her!
Maud came in, her head lower than usual, but still her unrepentant self no doubt. He was surprised at the size of her belly: perhaps it was only the way her dress was gathered over it, but he had calculated by the date of Malcolm’s visit that she should not be expecting to be confined until around Midsummer, and yet she looked nearly as large as Matilda.
Well, perhaps the child was Sigefrith’s after all. Of course! That would explain why she would risk the baby’s life by riding all the way to Nothelm. It was only Sigefrith’s child, so what mattered it? Alred wished he could be her husband for an hour so he could smack some mercy, truth, and righteousness into her.
“Alred,” she began in a soft voice, “I’ve come to see Matilda. How is she?”
“Why?” he snapped, scowling at her.
“Why, I… I… I was sorry I hadn’t been to see Colburga before her daughter… before Witburga died, and I – ”
“And so you came to see Matilda before she died, is that it?” he snarled. “That’s just your style, isn’t it, Maud? Come and slyly suggest to a man that his beloved is soon to die? I seem to recall that it is for something like this that Matilda hasn’t spoken three words to you in the last year!” His hands shook with the desire to take her by the neck and slam her head against the wall, as he had done a few months earlier with her lover.
“Oh, no!” she cried. “That’s not what I meant! I never meant – ”
“When’s your baby due, Maud? I’m surprised you risk it by riding over here, even for the fun of crowing over Matilda’s illness.”
What was she? seven, eight months? He tried counting backwards on his fingers, but in his state of agitation he found himself incapable of remembering how the months ran in the opposite order.
“For the first of May,” she replied, “but Sigefrith said I might come, and I never – ”
“Ah, then, it doesn’t matter, does it? It is only Sigefrith’s child!”
“Oh!” she wailed, her eyes wide with fright and suspicion.
Damn! In his rage over what she had said about Matilda, he had forgotten he wasn’t supposed to know! What an idiot he was! Well, it was too late now.
“And you once lectured me about ‘the true substance of honor!’” he growled in her face as she shrank terrified into the corner. “I never forgot the words you said to me that day, Maud! And your sin has not even the ‘outward appearance of honor’! Your sin has the ‘outward appearance’ of your lover!”
Maud sobbed and threw her arms up before her face to protect herself.
Alred spun away from her and picked up the object closest to hand, the glass lantern on his table, and hurled it into the opposite corner, where it landed with a satisfying smash. But oh, how much more satisfying it would have been to have thrown it at her face!
“Damn you!” he cried. And then, turning back to her, he said in a low voice, “No – no – no. I needn’t be the one to call for your damnation. You’re already damned. How low, how low you have fallen from the heights from which you looked down on me and talked to me about the true substance of honor! And you have no shame, and you do not repent – I have seen the wreck you are making of the finest man I ever knew… Good God’s blood,” he laughed cruelly, “how I have longed to say these things to you!”
“Don’t tell him!” she pleaded.
“I shan’t tell him. Only one person has the right to tell him.”
“Oh, Alred!” she sobbed. “I’m so unhappy!”
Alred took a step away from her, stunned. “You?” he breathed. “You see all this, all this misery in the world, and all you find to say is that you are unhappy? My wife is perhaps dying upstairs, and you tell me you are unhappy? Cenwulf and Colburga have lost their oldest daughter, and you tell me you are unhappy? Sigefrith is drinking himself to death over you, and you tell me you are unhappy?”
He shook his head. “Go home, Maud. I don’t want you so much as breathing the air that my wife breathes.” He wearily sat himself again at his table and held his head in his hands.
Maud stood trembling in the corner, her fair face blotched with red from her fright and her crying. She whispered, “Alred, I beg you – ”
“Go!” he roared, lifting his head. “Go! Harlot!”
Maud flew out of the room with a sob.
Alred laid his head in his hands and, once he was sure she was gone, began to sob as well.
) 
Chapters
Poor man, he finds his health again, only to be in agony over his wife's. I hope she'll be allright and the child will be healthy!