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didn’t even know her, and a husband who was little better than a brute. She had agreed to this marriage for her father’s sake, but although she would not admit it aloud, Alix knew that Alexander Givet would not live for very long. He would stay as long as he could for her sake. But one day even that would not be enough, and he would die.
    In the days that followed the royal family’s departure Alix found those who served her doing so with a grudging respect. They had expected someone associated with a queen to be high-blown and arrogant. Alix, however, was gentle-spoken and patient. She knew exactly how her household should be managed, and she guided her servants with a firm hand but kind words. Sir Udolf managed his poor lands carefully, attempting to teach his son who would one day inherit them, but Hayle had no forbearance for planting schedules, haying, harvesting, counting sheep or cattle. He wanted nothing more than to spend his time riding the hills hunting, or being with Maida.
    And each night, but for when her courses were upon her, he visited Alix’s bed in his attempt to sire a legitimate heir upon her. Alix hated that brief hour each night, but she bore it, for it was just about the only time she ever came in contact with her husband. But as Maida’s belly swelled Hayle began to become impatient that Alix showed no evidence of being with child.
    “I have been given a barren whore to wife,” he mocked her one evening.
    “Children should come from love, or at least respect. You neither love nor respect me,” Alix responded coldly.
    “If you cannot give me an heir, what good are you to me?” he snarled.
    “Perhaps it is you who are barren,” Alix snapped back at him. “Are you so certain the child that woman carries is yours? I have seen your Maida. She is very fair, perhaps even more so than I. Are the village lads so blind to her beauty that they leave her in peace? And was she a virgin when you first mounted her as I was, or had she taken lovers before you, sir? Perhaps if you showed me the tiniest bit of kindness, if you were gentle with me, I would conceive. But you are cruel, and you are hateful! It is not my fault that you cannot have the woman you love to wife. I treat you with respect, and ask nothing more than you do the same with me. But you are constantly flaunting your mistress before me. Always berating me because I am Alix and not Maida. If it were not for my sire I should have never agreed to this marriage. Be warned that when he dies, I will flee you at the first opportunity, Hayle Watteson. And you will never find me. You will not know if I am alive or dead. The church will not allow you to remarry without proof of my demise. And the law will not allow your bastard to inherit. Wulfborn will be brought down even as you will be brought down!”
    He swore at her in the darkness, reaching out to grasp her long hair. “Have I not warned you, whore, that you are never to speak to me when I come to your bed?” Then he began to beat her, but Alix pulled from his grip and quickly jumped from the bed before he could do any damage, hiding in a corner where he could not see her. With a violent oath, Hayle arose from the bed and stormed from the chamber. He did not return for several nights, much to her relief. But when he did, it was the same as it had ever been. Alix put him from her mind but for that one hour each night when she was forced to bear his company in the pitch-black silence.
    Her father had encouraged her to revive the old herb garden they found in the larger walled garden of the hall. “Look,” he said that late April day when he had spied it, “lavender, rosemary, sage, peppermint, and rue, mignon . You must begin to supply your apothecary. You will be responsible for your people should illness strike the hall or the village. Have you not learned from me the remedies necessary for caring for the sick?”
    “And how to bind and heal a wound,” Alix replied. “And to sew a