Chapter Two ~ Husbands and Wives

As much as Elisabeth dreaded her brother's departure for the Holy Land, there was an element of relief knowing she would not have to bear his relationship with Albrecht for much longer. There was a great deal to think about. She so trusted her twin that disapproval was of little import, at least disapproval of what he and Albrecht were doing when they were alone together. Two things troubled her, one being her sense of being irrevocably pushed out of her brother's heart, and the other her resentment that he had not shared any of this revelation about his love for Albrecht with her. She struggled with whether she must break through whatever held him back before they left or let him go and worry about that when he returned.

Then came a greater concern for them all. Her mother did not improve with the passing of the winter, but grew weaker. She seemed to lose her balance. She dropped things. She took to her bed with frequent headaches.

Elisabeth overheard a conversation between her parents where her father earnestly averred to delay his departure or even cancel his plans. Her mother protested vehemently.

"My lord, please do not. 'Tis but a temporary thing. I shall be well again shortly."

"Nay, my love. I cannot leave you in this state. And what's more I cannot leave our children to bear you up alone. Do not argue with me, dearest."

Her mother hesitated, and then Elisabeth heard her concession. "A delay, yes, that is all. You will see that I am right in no time. Then you will be able to catch up with your friends on their way to the Holy Land."

Elisabeth sighed with relief and went to tell Elias what she had heard.

She was not surprised to see the conflict in his face at the tidings. He chewed his lower lip. "Yes, it is best we delay," he replied with undisguised regret. His glance around she interpreted immediately. "I had better tell Albrecht as well."

Their household activity multiplied with an unwonted if expected distraction, as if the Lady Adalberta could manage all she had. The sound of horns announced the impending arrival of Reinhardt, Baron von Linkshändig, and his large party of knights and soldiers. As she stood in the courtyard with her parents and brother, Elisabeth, dressed in her best gown, realized how predisposed to resenting her intended she was. That she was about to become the man's wife was almost out of the range of credibility.

She heard her mother's groan when, following Reinhardt and his household knights, the horses and foot soldiers continued to stream through the manor gate for what felt like a half hour. She heard her mother call to Albrecht to run inside and warn that the household would have to feed and accommodate.

Reinhardt reined in his destrier before the noble family welcoming him. He saluted Sigismund, and then looked over at the twins. Elisabeth saw him frown as his eyes lit on her. She colored sharply and looked down, avoiding his gaze. Then hope leaped in her heart. "Maybe he will decide he doesn't want me!" she rejoiced silently. She felt Elias's supporting arm around her waist, and cast him a grateful look.

Reinhardt did not wait for the groom who pushed forward the mounting block but threw his leg over the destrier's armored head and slid to the ground deftly. He was older than Elisabeth remembered, and more comely. He stood by his mount for a moment, pushing his mail hood back and off his black hair. Gray eyes did not reflect his courteous smile. He went to Adalberta and took her hand in his to kiss it. He struck his booted heels together and said, "My lady, my thanks for your hospitality."

"You are most welcome, good sir, at any time. But on this joyous occasion of your wedding to my daughter Elisabeth, it is indeed a pleasure and an honor." She glanced over and beckoned to Elisabeth. "My dear, come greet your husband to be."

Elisabeth felt the squeeze Elias gave to her elbow as she stepped away from him to join her parents and the baron. She kept her eyes down fearing she would be unable to stop herself from bursting into tense laughter. It was all so unreal.

"My lady," came the rich baritone of the man she was to marry. "It is with humble gratitude that I hear you have accepted my offer of matrimony."

As he lifted her hand to his lips, she looked up surprised. Accepted his offer? As if she had any real choice. He looked up through dark thin lashes straight into her face. She saw his gaze jump from her own to her mouth, her braids, her throat, her flat bosom. He sighed so quietly only she heard it. It was not a sigh of pleasure.

"My lord, I welcome you to our home." Elisabeth found herself thinking, "And may you decide to stay in the Holy Land rather than return."

She stole glances at Reinhardt during the evening's repast, sitting between him and her father. The baron greeted the news that Sigismund would delay his own departure with little Grace. "I hope you do not expect me to remain behind while you perform your uxorious duty."

Sigismund gazed with approbation at the baron's remark, but he nevertheless reassured him. "My lady assures me that she be well directly, at which time I will leave. You say you are taking the western pass over the mountains?"

"Yes, to meet with the Frankish contingent. We will pass into the Italian Peninsula nearer Milan."

"Then perhaps I can use the eastern pass and meet you on the way to Calabria. It is shorter." He lifted one eyebrow at Reinhardt.

"Perhaps," was the baron's desultory response.

The two men spoke exclusively of the journey to come. Elias and Albrecht hung on every word they could catch as they waited on the high table at the top of the hall. Reinhardt grimaced at her brother, a fact that mystified Elisabeth. It did not seem to her that Elias was doing anything that was not respectful and proper.

"Your son," Reinhardt addressed her father. "He is coming with you to Palestine?"

"Yes, yes, and the other squire as well. I will knight my son before we leave, of course. He is the elder and well deserves it."

She caught the triumphant exchange of smiles between the two boys. Then glancing over saw Reinhardt suppress a frown. "I suppose he will need a squire of his own, then?"

Elias, interrupting the conversation at the high table broke in, "No, Father feels Albrecht may serve us both."

Reinhardt muttered, "Indeed?" but acknowledged it when Sigismund apologized for his overanxious son's lapse in manners.

"Our needs are not so onerous that the boy cannot take care of both. If it proves unworkable, I am sure there will be plenty of young men of squire's rank and training that I can take into my employ."

Reinhardt leveled cold gray eyes on his host. "You would let your son keep your current squire?"

"They are so good together. I should not want to break them apart."

A soft chuckle from Reinhardt made Elisabeth look at him sharply. He caught her gaze, reached for her hand and lifted it to his lips. "You are such a loving family, my dear. You should make a most attentive mother."

Adalberta chimed in, "My daughter is an accomplished needle worker and has all the knowledge and skills she needs to conduct a sound household."

Elisabeth blushed scarlet and dropped her eyes. To her horror Reinhardt put his fingertips under her chin and raised her face to his. His thumb came up and brushed her lower lip. If she could have gotten any redder, she would have. "My dear Elisabeth, you are so young, so fresh. By the time we are returned to Bavaria from the Holy Land, laden with plunder, you shall have filled out into your full womanly form. Then you shall come to my castle to be its mistress."

Her heart sank. He still wanted her, in spite of his obvious disappointment in how she looked. He perhaps believed it was the slender awkwardness of girlhood. Who knows? He could be right. She was not sure whether she wanted him to be.

Adalberta touched her husband's arm. He looked back at her, and then seemed to remember something. "My lord, there is one thing my wife and I would like to discuss with you before your wedding."

"I should think the arrangements regarding dower and inheritance were clear enough," the baron responded curiously.

Sigismund looked uncomfortable. "We shall discuss it after the young people have left the table."

Reinhardt's lifted eyebrow stayed in place as he glanced over at Elisabeth. He began cautiously, "I imagine you wish to make something clear about the wedding night?"

Elisabeth was horrified. She could not recall a squeak of shock. Covering her face with both hands, she leaped from her seat and ran indecorously out of the hall.

Sigismund sighed. "We have not discussed this with the girl yet." Looking up at his son, he said, "Go to your sister, Elias. Calm her down."

Torn between his affection for her and intense curiosity he rose and followed her out of the hall into the courtyard.

Albrecht remained, fading into the flickering shadows to listen without being noticed.

In the courtyard Elias had found it impossible to calm his sister. She would neither speak to him nor look at him. He was relieved when Albrecht finally joined them where they sat on the mounting block.

"I think you will be pleased at what has been agreed upon, my lady," Albrecht said reassuringly.

Elisabeth lifted her tearstained face. "What?"

Albrecht glanced at Elias and grinned. "Your mother and father will not permit the marriage to be consummated until the baron returns from Palestine."

"They . . . they will not? And the baron agreed?" Elisabeth's relief was easy to hear in her voice.

"Well, he wasn't happy, but it was your dower and inheritance about which he worried. He was afraid they would renege on the agreement. He made them promise to stipulate that the lack of consummation did not allow for annulment."

"Why did they do it? My parents, I mean?" she asked.

"They said you were not ready to be a complete woman, and your mother said she did not want you burdened with his child not knowing if and when he would return."

Elias inquired, "And he went along with it?"

"So long as it does not jeopardize the transfer of your dower and property to him."

"That figures," Elias said sardonically. Turning back to his sister, he remarked irreverently, "Just think, you may be a widow before you are even deflowered."

Elisabeth chastised, "Elias!" and the three made the sign of the cross. But then she smiled.

As Elisabeth, relieved, left the boys to go to her rest, Albrecht held Elias back, saying, "There's something I have to tell you."

Elisabeth slowed her steps long enough to hear something about Reinhardt knowing the boy's secret. She heard Elias exclaim, "How can he? Don't be ridiculous. It is your imagining."

Over the few days before the wedding, Elisabeth had ample time to observe the man she was about to marry. He spent what time he did not spend talking with his knights and the commander of his foot soldiers looking about the manor and its surrounding lands. He asked her father's steward for a tour of the holdings. The only time she saw him smile was while in conversation with that same steward. The few times she caught him looking at her, she saw a mix of speculation and distaste on his thin lips. He sat stroking his pointed beard, just showing the tinge of gray in the black hairs under his lower lip, surveying her body, front and back.

"I am surprised he has not checked my teeth nor taken my ankle to examine my hoof," she confided to Elias.

Her brother laughed. "Darling Elli, he has done that, but to your lands, not your adorable person."

She looked at him, questioning. "But he cannot expect to get Papa's holdings! Those will go to you! You and your wife and children." Her voice trailed off. She had seen his slight reddening and his quick glance in Albrecht's direction.

He put on his usual cheery expression. "Ah, but I heard Father assuring him that you shall have the income from one-third of the revenue from the estate."

Elisabeth's mouth hung open. "Really?" He nodded. It was an unheard-of arrangement, making such a generous provision for a daughter.

Father Boniface, the household priest, conducted the mass and the bridal ceremony in the family's small church. Elisabeth told her brother and Albrecht she felt like one of those overdressed dolls her mother had brought from her own childhood home in Lombardy.

Elias took her in his arms and planted a kiss on her brow. "You are beautiful, sister. Simply beautiful. I even saw your betrothed giving you an appreciative look."

She pushed him away roughly. "I am not beautiful. Do not even say that. I am plain. I look more like a boy than you do." She saw his raised eyebrow and hurt look. "I don't mean you are girlish, Elias. Just that I am not."

His eyes grew serious. "Elisabeth, anyone who knows you knows you are beautiful in ways few women can boast. Your great heart, your wide smile and delighted laughter, your constancy and your loving nature. And you have a cute little nose."

She laughed and slapped at him. "Oh stop!"

At the banquet following the ceremony, the baron presented his new wife with rich gifts. He gave her bolts of fine soft wool in rich colors he said came from Flanders. He leaned to clasp a necklace of pale matched pearls around her throat and paused to look into her eyes as he withdrew. Hesitating, he leaned in again and gave her a kiss on her lips. She looked up at his eyes, her own round and disbelieving, while her fingers went to her lips.

He chuckled. "There will be many more and better to come, little wench. We have a dynasty to maintain."

Their wedding night was a formality. The two were conducted to a bedchamber where they were toasted. The company put them to bed together, fully clothed. They were allowed to remain thus overnight, but with a watchful maid and the candles burning. Elisabeth noted Reinhardt's resentful glare at Sigismund before the man left them alone.

Not long after and in spite of their watcher, Reinhardt arose and took off all but his shirt and britches. He gave her a grim look. "I am not going to be miserable all night. You do as you please."

She was frozen where she lay on the far side of the bed. "Suit yourself," her husband shrugged. He slipped under the covers and rolled onto his side to look at her. His head propped on his arm, he said, "I hope you will not be this frigid when we can truly become man and wife." He chuckled at her horrified look. "It does not matter. You are my wife, not my leman. You are for bearing children. You do not have to enjoy the act of begetting them. In fact, better you do not. I may like a wanton in my bed, but I do not want that wanton to be my wife."

He reached his other arm and put his hand on her breast. He stroked her up and down, all the way to her belly. She tensed and stared at him, afraid that he was going to do what he wanted in spite of his promise to her parents. The fear gave an edge to another feeling she was having. She felt tingly wherever he stroked. He chuckled as she started to fidget and laughed aloud when she made an incoherent protest and reached out and shoved him roughly away with the heels of her palms.

"You swine!" she spat at him. "Marta, get my father!"

"If she goes to get your father, that will leave us alone. Are you sure you want that? Maybe you do." He started to lean over her again.

Elisabeth managed an elbow into his solar plexus. He jumped back with a gasp. "My God, you pack a punch, girl!"

Marta was rising, making distressed noises, and turning to the door.

"Don't bother, bitch," Reinhardt said. "I'll leave her alone." He turned over and put his back to the seething girl. He leaned to say over his shoulder, "For now." He chuckled again, punched his pillow, and laid down his head.

Marta, wringing her hands, looked to Elisabeth. After a few moments, the girl nodded. "It's all right." She felt under her own pillow for her eating knife. She would not sleep a wink this night, waiting for Reinhardt to try something else. She sat up, putting the pillow behind her back, crossed her arms and glared at the man. Even when he was obviously asleep, she kept her watch.

"I am sorry you are not leaving with my party as I invited," the baron said flatly to Sigismund as he stepped onto the mounting block and mounted his horse.

As the baron and his party rode out of the gates, Elisabeth raised her eyes to watch them disappear. Elias stepped up to her side and put his arm around her shoulders. He whispered, "I never thought I would say this, but if one Saracen gets through our lines with his sword, I hope he makes one Christian kill."

Elisabeth let out a most unladylike snort.

Adalberta took to her bed that same night. She protested vainly that she was simply tired, but Sigismund's eyes as he watched her revealed deep concern.

Elias and Albrecht also watched, knowing that with each passing month their chance to go on pilgrimage to Jerusalem was slipping away.

As the weakness did not abate and his wife found it harder and harder to hide that she was in pain, his eyes grew haunted. He chided himself for his delay in leaving on crusade. If he had gone early, he might have been at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher by now, praying fervently for his wife's recovery. It was thanks to his inexcusable delay that she now lay dying, moaning in pain, gasping with the agony.

Left to themselves the twins and their constant companion guiltily fled the manor to get away from the moans and cries and the helpless look on their father's face. They redoubled their practice at arms, and Elias forced the weapon master to teach his sister what he had taught him. When the man protested to Sigismund, the distracted lord just waved him away. "Do what the boy says. Just leave me alone."

One morning, the three made their way to Magdalena's isolated cottage, and Elisabeth begged her to come back to the manor and help her mother. She refused. "Oh my dear one, you know I cannot. I made a solemn vow never to leave this place."

Looking quickly at Elias Elisabeth urged, "Can we not bring Mother here?"

Her brother, whose eyes showed the weariness of lack of hope, shook his head. "Do you really want her to go through the pain of being brought here?"

Seeing Albrecht reach to put his hand on Elias's arm, Elisabeth's desperation turned into anger and resentment. "Oh, you two! Can't you keep your hands off each other?"

The shock showing on all three faces brought Elisabeth back to herself. "Oh, my dears, I am so sorry. I just . . . I don't know." She stood, covering her mouth with her hand. With a sob she dashed away.

"Let her go," the older woman said as Elias started to go after her.

He slowly turned and looked at her. "Does she know? About Albrecht and me?" At the woman's grave nod, he subsided. "How?" he asked.

"Does that matter?" the woman asked.

Elias shrugged. "What . . . how . . . does she feel? Does she hate me, us?"

"That is something you should speak with Elisabeth about, but I do not think so. She is confused. She feels like she has lost you, Elias."

He looked up sharply. "My love for Albrecht does not lessen my love for her!" he said firmly.

The woman smiled wanly. "You need to tell her that, show her that. Especially now with your mother dying."

The tall young man slumped, his face growing miserable and the tears starting to course down his cheeks. Albrecht put his arms tight around him. Elias started to sob as Albrecht held him.

They found Elisabeth in the practice yard swinging a sword with all her might.

"Leave me with her, won't you, my love?" Elias said quietly to Albrecht, who nodded, squeezed his arm and, head bowed, walked away.

Her brother watched her, seeing no let-up in the ferocity of her swings. "Elli!" he finally called. She did not stop, so he shouted, "Elli, hold!"

The young woman slowed her swings until her arms drooped at her sides, the sword point touching the dirt. She breathed heavily, the breaths coming out more and more like sobs. Elias advanced gradually to stand before her. "Is it safe?" he asked with his joking grin.

She looked up into his face, her eyes wide. "Oh you," she spat and shoved him in the chest with the heel of one hand.

"Apparently not!" her brother said as he pretended her shove almost knocked him off his feet. He held out his arms, and Elisabeth resignedly walked into them.

Shushing her as he pressed her face into his shoulder, he wrapped his arms around her. "Elli, what I feel for Albrecht has nothing to do with how I feel for you. You are my sister, my twin. We are almost not two different people. You must know that." He felt her hesitant nod against the side of his neck. "I love you, Elli, more than I can say."

Her muffled words were nevertheless clear enough to him. "I love you too, Elias. I-I just do not understand. How did it happen?"

He sighed and shrugged. "I do not really know. It just did."

Looking up from his shoulder with red and puffy eyes, she asked, "When?"

He wiped a tear from her cheek. "When what?"

"When did you know . . . about loving Albrecht, I mean?"

He shrugged again. "Almost as soon as he came to live here, I suppose. I did not understand what I was feeling at first. I think he knew before I did. It's . . . I can't explain. I don't really want to explain." His cheeks burned with embarrassment.

She put her palm to his reddening cheek. "Shhh, shhh," she soothed. "You talked to Magdalena," she stated.

Elias nodded. He gave a rough laugh. "I thought I was going to burn in Hell for all eternity. She told us love is love, that God is love, and all that. I couldn't believe that the kind of love we had, the . . . well, the physical, cannot be what she meant. It's one reason he and I wanted to go on the crusade. The Holy Father said that everyone who made it to Jerusalem would be forgiven all their sins, past, present and future."

She peered into his face, curious. "So you meant to keep . . . doing whatever with Albrecht, even afterwards?"

The look in his eyes was poignant. "Elli, I love him. I could never give him up. I would rather go to Hell." His lips twisted in pain.

"You are not going to Hell. Or if you do, then I will go there with you and Albrecht. I could not stand a God who would punish my sweet, loving brother for just doing what feels right to him."

Her gaze was so fierce Elias could not help but grin and then laugh. "Oh, Elli, you are such a termagant. I think they should send you on crusade. You would frighten the unbelief out of all the heathens!"

She looked outraged for a moment, and then her own face crumpled into laughter. "You go now and tell Albrecht that as far as I am concerned, I have two brothers."

Elias feigned horror. "Oh no, that would be incest on top of sodomy!"

Elisabeth stepped back and put her hands on her hips. "Good thing there will probably be more crusades. You two are going to need it!"