Malcolm hesitated in the doorway, for Egelric had begun to laugh as soon as he had opened the door.
“What did I do?” he asked with a growing sense of outraged dignity.
“Come in, Malcolm,” Egelric said. “I was just telling Wyn that we weren’t likely to be interrupted, with half of my household at Nothelm and the other half on holiday.”
“Sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. It simply means Wyn hasn’t lost his talent for inventing distractions for me, if he can operate at a distance to summon you all the way out here even while he is sitting here with me.”
Ethelwyn sighed and rose to leave the two men alone. “It simply takes more and more to impress you these days.”
“What are you doing out here anyway?” Egelric asked Malcolm. “You do know that I shall be back at Nothelm no later than by suppertime, don’t you?”
“I know,” Malcolm said. “Her Grace has already invited us to dine.”
“Pass within thirty yards of her nose, did you?”
Malcolm laughed. “Is that the range at which she operates her invitations?”
“Aengus and I are still working out the calculations. So far all we know is that if she can see you, she’ll invite you. I hope you didn’t disappoint her.”
“Oh, no. At least not until that barrel runs dry. There may never be another such.”
“His Grace means to repeat the experiment,” Egelric said, “and may Bacchus smile fondly upon it. But what brings you out here, in that case, if I am to see you at supper?”
“I wanted to speak to you out of the range of my wife’s ears.”
“If Wulf is any indication, an hour’s ride ought to just about do that, if we speak softly.”
Malcolm laughed and sat in the chair that the steward had recently left.
“I don’t know how I never noticed with Iylaine,” Egelric sighed.
Malcolm smiled at the memory. “I told her not to tell you she could hear so well.”
“What?” Egelric cried.
“I figured it out when she was little and told her to tell me whatever she heard.”
“The devil you did! There were times when we thought you were gifted with powers of divination.”
“I’m not saying I’m not. But Iylaine has always been my accomplice,” he said proudly.
Egelric smiled at him with a strange, sad fondness for a moment, and then he asked, “So what did you want to tell me that you don’t want your accomplice to hear?”
“I wanted to ask your opinion about going home to my father’s with you.”
“Aye?”
“What do you suppose would happen if I went with you and Iylaine stayed? I’m not saying it’s what I want to do,” he added hastily. “But I want to consider all the facts.”
“She can come too, you know. Synne’s going, of course, and so is Lili, so there will be a woman even on the way back.”
“I know. But I mentioned it to her, and she said, ‘But we were just there in the spring.’ So I suppose that means she doesn’t want to go.”
“That sounds like a reasonable conclusion.”
“But what do you suppose would happen if I went alone?”
“You might also wonder what would happen if you took her. The elf claims she is still bound to him. She may be ill after all.”
“But she is bound to me.”
“If she is, then I do not know what that means for the two of you. Sela was not bound to another elf, to my knowledge. When I left her for a month, she was quite ill. However, I am a man, and I did not feel anything but longing for her, which I also felt last year when I left Lili, and was probably only a man’s longing for his wife.”
“So you think that if I leave Iylaine, she will be ill and I shall not.”
“Perhaps. The elf didn’t say you were bound to her—only that he still was.”
“I wish you had questioned him further,” Malcolm grumbled.
“It… it would have seemed rather cruel.”
Malcolm choked down his rising temper. He had not approved of that one meeting between Iylaine and the elf; he did not trust the elf not to cast some other spell on her, and in any case he would have asked him a few additional questions if he had been there to do it.
“I suppose the only way to find out is to try it,” Egelric said, “but honestly I hope you will not attempt the experiment. I don’t like the idea of her here alone with neither you nor me.”
“I shan’t go without her. I think I would go mad with worry. I only wish she would go with me. I should like my mother to see her happy, as she is now. I think she frightened my mother the last time. She was so ill and seemed so distressed…”
“I shall tell your mother that she is very happy.”
“I shall write her a letter in any case. Anyway… perhaps I shouldn’t ask Iylaine to ride so far on a horse just now…” Malcolm mumbled.
“Oh ho!” Egelric cried. “What’s this?”
“I don’t know,” Malcolm said, squirming in his awkwardness, but speaking hastily now that he had finally managed to broach the subject. “I wished to ask you about that too.”
“Ask me?”
“You were married to an elf woman. So perhaps you can tell me… do they bleed like our women?”
“Oh, Malcolm!” Egelric groaned. “Have mercy! You have an elf wife. Why don’t you ask her?”
“Because it’s Iylaine.”
“I know, I know. And the girl can’t even speak of babies without resorting to reptiles. The devil only knows her code word for… that.”
Malcolm waited, hoping that he would not be obliged to ask again.
“Well,” Egelric sighed, “they do and they don’t. It seems to me it was not so often. Not every month. At least that is the impression I have from being married to two women who were and are disappointed once a month.”
“Lili too?”
“Lili seems to be longing for a baby ever since she lost hers. Let’s not talk about that. You’ve already made me nervous and now you’ll be breaking my heart.”
“Sorry.”
“Sela never seemed to care, but she had Wulf right away. Nine months afterwards in fact. We were first together on Midsummer Eve, and Wulf was born on the first day of spring following. And then she was nursing him and then Gils. But I think even afterwards it was not every month. Every few months or so. But the devil knows I never paid much attention. That is one of the details of everyday life I prefer to ignore.”
“But Iylaine and I have been together for four months now.”
“And she never bled?”
“I… am not certain…”
“Oh, Malcolm! God help me! Please don’t ask me to explain. Ask Alred or someone who knows how women work. Or better yet, ask Maire.”
“Sorry. Perhaps I shall.” But Malcolm did not think he would have the courage. “I don’t think she did, though.”
“Why don’t you simply ask her, Malcolm?”
Malcolm did not have an answer to that.
“I know, I know,” Egelric muttered. “It’s Iylaine.”
“And you know,” Malcolm said eagerly, “she’s getting fatter lately, and Mother Curran says she thinks it’s either because she’s happy or because she’s expecting.”
“It is true that I have not seen the girl so pinchable since she was in short dresses,” Egelric nodded. “And she seems to be slowing down, don’t you think?”
“What do you mean?” Malcolm asked.
“When Sela was carrying Wulf, she became quite lazy and slow, like a cat in the sun.”
“That’s true!” Malcolm cried. “She doesn’t pace and fret any longer, and she doesn’t ask to go for rides or go for walks. She simply likes to sit in the evenings with me. And she keeps dragging blankets into the turtle room and building a nest against the wall.”
“A nest?” Egelric laughed.
“Like a mama cat. She does it every afternoon and naps there.”
Egelric grinned foolishly. “I’ve never known her to do anything like that before.”
“Neither have I,” Malcolm said, grinning back at him.
Chapters
So now they start to catch on. I wonder if Iylaine herself understands what's going on?