When Christ and His Saints Slept by Sharon Kay Penman Page B

ask instead of order, and you’d get better results.”
    Geoffrey could feel heat rising resentfully in his face. “I was willing to treat you well. You were the one who—” No, not again. This time he would not be provoked—by Corpus, he would not. “Fair enough,” he said brusquely. “I show you courtesy and you show me respect. Anything else?”
    “You truly need to ask? Look at my face!”
    “That was as much your doing as mine!”
    “What are you saying—that I wanted to be hit?”
    “I am saying it would not have happened if not for your shrew’s temper and poison tongue. You do not want it to happen again? That is fine with me. Just do not give me cause, as easy as that.”
    Maude clenched her fists in the folds of her skirt. Her breathing had quickened, but she couldn’t seem to get enough air into her lungs and she felt as if she were going to suffocate on her choked-back rage. She said nothing, but gave Geoffrey a look of utter loathing, a look that was not lost upon him.
    “We are agreed, then,” he said, “that we stop entertaining all of Anjou with our feuding. From now on, we do our squabbling behind closed doors. Is that understood?”
    “Yes, I understand. All your talk of change was just that—talk. You do not want to make peace between us. You do not even want a truce, merely a public pretense.”
    “A ‘public pretense’ is the best I can hope for—dear wife. If you were to tell me otherwise, I’d know you lied. You can no more sheathe your claws than a wildcat can, and as for your bed thawing out…well, we’ll see the Second Coming first.”
    Maude flushed. “If my bed is cold, the blame is yours.”
    “The Devil it is!”
    “If you treated your yellow-haired harlot the way you do me, you’d have to pay her a lot more money than you do now! You never ask, you just take. You force yourself upon me whenever you choose, and you do not care if I am ailing or tired. It is not unreasonable to want to say no sometimes. But then, you’d never hear me, would you?”
    Geoffrey was incredulous. “Christ Jesus, woman, you make it sound as if I rape you!”
    “You do,” she said flatly, and his disbelief exploded into outrage.
    “Have you gone mad?” When he strode toward her, she took an involuntary backward step, for although she was tall for a woman, he still towered above her. “I have every right to lay with you, for you are my wife! Need I remind you of that?”
    “As if I could forget!”
    His eyes were of a changeable color, blue or grey depending upon his mood or the light. They were dark now, like slate. He’d made no move to touch her, but as soon as she could retreat without seeming to, she put some space between them.
    “I would to God I knew what ails you, woman. Mayhap you’re not just bad-tempered and perverse, mayhap you’re truly crazy! I do not know how else to explain half of what you say. Unless you are mocking me? Is that it, Maude?”
    “No!” she protested. “Why is it honesty when a man speaks his mind and madness when a woman does?”
    He shook his head in disgust. “God help the English if ever you do become queen. But until then, you are going to do what I say. I am not offering you a choice, Maude. I can compel your obedience if need be, and we both know that.”
    Maude swallowed. “I am not afraid of you, Geoffrey.”
    “Then you are truly a fool,” he said coldly, “for you’ve given me no reason to think fondly of you. You’ve proven yourself to be a disagreeable companion, an indifferent bedmate, and a barren wife…Have I left any of your failings out?”
    Maude gasped. “That is not so! I bore the emperor a son!”
    “Dead,” he shot back. “What good does it do a man to have a stillborn heir?”
    “My son lived…” she began, but she got no further; to her horror, her voice was no longer steady.
    “Not long enough. How old were you when you started to share the imperial bed…thirteen? Fourteen? So you had nigh on ten years