The Pillars of the Earth - Ken Follett [91]
He mounted the stairs and entered the hall. It was full of people, but the earl was not among them. In the far lefthand corner was the staircase leading to his bedroom, and fifteen or twenty knights and men-at-arms sat around the foot of the stairs, talking together in low tones. This was unusual. Knights and men-at-arms formed separate social classes. The knights were landowners who supported themselves by rents, whereas the men-at-arms were paid by the day. The two groups became comradely only when the smell of war was in the wind.
William recognized some of them: there was Gilbert Catface, a bad-tempered old fighter with an unfashionable beard and long whiskers, past forty years but still tough; Ralph of Lyme, who spent more on clothes than on a bride, today wearing a blue cloak with a red silk lining; Jack fitz Guillaume, already a knight although hardly older than William; and several others whose faces were vaguely familiar. He nodded in their general direction, but they took little notice of him—he was well known, but he was too young to be important.
He turned and looked around the other side of the hall, and saw Aliena immediately.
She looked quite different today. Yesterday she had been dressed up for the cathedral, in silk and fine wool and linen, with rings and ribbons and pointed boots. Today she wore the short tunic of a peasant woman or a child, and her feet were bare. She was sitting on a bench, studying a game board on which were counters of different colors. As William watched, she hitched up her tunic and crossed her legs, revealing her knees, and then wrinkled her nose in a frown. Yesterday she had been formidably sophisticated; today she was a vulnerable child, and William found her even more desirable. He suddenly felt ashamed that this child had been able to cause him so much distress, and he yearned for some way of showing her that he could master her. It was a feeling almost like lust.
She was playing with a boy three years or so younger than she. He had a restless, impatient look: he did not like the game. William could see a family resemblance between the two players. Indeed, the boy looked like Aliena as William remembered her from childhood, with a snub nose and short hair. This must be her younger brother Richard, the heir to the earldom.
William went closer. Richard glanced up at him, then returned his attention to the board. Aliena was concentrating. Their painted wooden board was shaped like a cross and divided into squares of different colors. The counters appeared to be made of ivory, white and black. The game was obviously a variant of merels, or ninemen’s morris, and probably a gift brought back from Normandy by Aliena’s father. William was more interested in Aliena. When she leaned forward over the board, the neck of her tunic bowed out, and he could see the tops of her breasts. They were as large as he had imagined. His mouth went dry.
Richard moved a counter on the board, and Aliena said: “No, you can’t do that.”
The boy was put out. “Why not?”
“Because it’s against the rules, stupid.”
“I don’t like the rules,” Richard said petulantly.
Aliena flared up. “You have to obey the rules!”
“Why do I?”
“You just do, that’s why!”
“Well, I don’t,” he said, and he tipped the board off the bench onto the floor, sending the counters flying.
Quick as a flash, Aliena slapped his face.
He cried out, his pride as well as his face stung. “You—” He hesitated. “You devil-fucker,” he shouted. He turned and ran away—but after three steps he cannoned into William.
William picked him up by one arm and held him in midair. “Don’t let the priest hear you call your sister such names,” he said.
Richard wriggled and squealed. “You’re hurting me—let me go!”
William held him a little longer. Richard stopped struggling and