Hugo laughed and touched his hunter slightly with his heels. At once the big horse surged forwards. Alys' mare followed quickly, her stride rapid. Alys bounced in the saddle, clinging to the pommel, praying that Hugo would not look back and see her white-faced and afraid.

He did not. They rode for some minutes along the track, the servants cantering along behind them. Then Hugo pulled up the roan and the mare stopped abruptly, throwing Alys forward on to the neck. She held on by a firm grip on the saddle, and heaved herself back into place.

'Here,' he said. 'Here will be the gates. I shall build a great wall all around this area and leave the land inside as it is: trees and shrubs and grass. I shall have deer roaming inside the wall, maybe even some boar for me to hunt. I shall have a cottage here at the gates and a gatekeeper. No guardroom, no soldiers. And then from here I shall make a track to the front door.' He pointed ahead of them. Alys could see about twenty men digging and carrying. 'Is it to be of brick or stone?' Alys asked. 'The main pillars of the house are stone, but it will be faced with brick,' Hugo said proudly. 'It's a pretty brick, a warm colour. It looks well against the stone. They are making the bricks and firing them here.' 'And the stone?' Alys asked idly, looking around. 'From the nunnery,' Hugo said. 'I had them bring the stones up here. Some of them are handsomely carved. I shall use the slates from their roof as well, and some of their beams that were not burned. Shall you laugh, Alys, to be my whore under a nun's roof?

Alys felt her skin grow cold. She turned away. 'And not far from the river!' she said. Her voice was strained but Hugo was unaware.

'I may divert it and dam it and make some little lakes,' he said. 'For fish and for pleasure. I love the sound of water. It's the only thing I will miss when we leave the castle, the sound of water.'

Alys nodded. 'And you must plant pretty gardens,' she said. 'I shall supervise a herb garden, a proper knot garden, an orchard and an aviary!'

Hugo laughed. 'Yes, you shall,' he said. 'And a still-room,' Alys said. In her mind she could smell the clean, light smell of the still-room at the nunnery. 'We shall have a physic garden, a herb garden, and a still-room where I shall make medicines for you and me and our family.'

'You can have some of the gear from the nuns,' Hugo said. 'A lot of it was brought away safe. Pestles and mortars and measuring bowls and the like. Some good glass bottles, too, with golden labels.'

Alys felt her mouth grow dry. Then she nodded, shook her head back and laughed, a high reckless laugh. 'Yes,' she said. 'Why not! Everything that the nuns had and that you took from them we can use. Why should it go to waste? Why should anything be spoiled? Let us take and take anything we need until we have the house just as we want it!'

Hugo jumped down from his horse and held out his arms to her. Alys slid off her horse down to him and leaned against him as he held her close. 'I love you, Alys,' he said. ‘I love your hunger for life. You would rob an old nun of her very shift, wouldn't you – if you had need of it?' Alys looked up into his dark smiling face. 'I would,' she said. She felt at once a fierce, destructive joy. 'I have no patience with nuns, always confessing and forbearing, and avoiding sin. I want to live now. I want to have my joys now and my pleasures. If I am a damned sinner then at least I shall go to my punishment with the taste of everything I wanted still warm on my tongue.'

Hugo laughed with her. 'You must make some magic here,' he urged. 'When the workmen leave one evening we will come and you can summon your wild sisters and we can lie on the half-built walls and on the ground together and we can claim the very stones and the slates back from the nuns and dedicate the house to ourselves and to our pleasure!'

'Oh yes!' Alys said hollowly. 'Yes.'

'I want a green gown,' Alys said idly. She and Hugo were sprawled on the high bed in her room. There were new hangings on the wall to match the new curtains on the bed. A fire burned in the grate with sweet-smelling pine cones and a pinch of incense. Outside the summer sky was striped with gold as the sun slowly set. 'I want a green silk gown for summer.'

Hugo lifted a hank of Alys' golden-brown hair. 'You're an expensive wench,' he said idly. 'I have given you yards and yards of cloth for one gown after another. Anyway, you have no right to wear silk.'

Alys chuckled, a low, lazy laugh. 'You can give it to me as a portent,' she said. 'Your father has promised me land and money when our son is born. Then I will be a freeholder.'

'Has he?' Hugo looked surprised, 'You have him under your thumb, my little witch, don't you? I've never known him give land away before. Not even Meg, his favourite whore, had land from him! He has you very close to his heart, doesn't he?'

Alys looked smugly at him. 'He loves me as if I were his daughter,' she said with quiet pleasure. 'And he wants me to go out with him when you cut the last of the hay. And I want a new green gown. A trader showed it to me yesterday. It's pure silk, it will cost a fortune. He brought it to show Catherine but she would not fit a wagon-cover. He showed it to me instead and I long for it, Hugo!'

Hugo chuckled. 'Persistent wench! You have as many gowns as Catherine -I swear it.'

Alys sighed and dropped a kiss on his bare shoulder as he lay naked and at peace on her bed, his long limbs gilded with the sunlight from the arrow-slit. 'No,' she said. 'Catherine has more gowns than me. She has all the gowns from her mother's chests. And you have bought her more gowns than you have ever bought for me.'

Hugo shook his head. 'Damned if I can think when,' he said. 'No more than one a year for all the years we have been married. But you, Alys! You want a gown a week!'

Alys smiled. 'Why should I not have as many gowns as Catherine?' she asked. 'You would rather see me in a new gown than her, wouldn't you? And you would rather strip me, than her, wouldn't you?'

Hugo shrugged. 'How many does she have?' he asked in mock weariness. 'Twelve,' Alys said.

Hugo rolled over on to his belly. Alys saw that his eyes were bright and he was laughing. 'And how many do you have, my little witch?' he asked.

'Eleven!' Alys said triumphantly. 'And now I want a green gown!' 'Then will you be satisfied?' Hugo demanded. Alys sat up, threw back her hair and swarmed up along his body so she was lying along his back. She pressed her hips forward slightly, pushing against Hugo's warm, naked buttocks.

'Do you want me satisfied? Satisfied and plump? Plump and tired? Boring?' she asked. She thrust a little harder with each word. Hugo groaned and closed his eyes.

'Witch,' he said under his breath. 'You would make a dead man feel desire.'

Alys laughed and put her arms around his waist. Her hand slid between his belly and the rumpled sheets of her bed. She found his penis and held him, hard. Hugo groaned and tried to turn over.

'No,' Alys said, whispering into his ear. 'I have you in my power, Hugo. I will have you like this!'

Hugo struggled for only a moment and then as Alys' hand insistently pressed him he plunged his face and his body deeper into the bed and felt her push and push him from behind, her hand working, until with a slow groan he lay still. Alys laid her cheek against his sweating shoulder blade, and rested, lying like a long, naked snake along his back.

Hugo shook his head like a man waking from a powerful dream and rolled over. 'Alys, my love,' he said. She smiled at him. 'The green gown,' she stipulated. 'And ribbons and gloves to match.'

He took her in his arms. 'A thousand gowns,' he said, kissing her neck, the hollow of her collar bone and the rumpled mass of her hair. 'A thousand gowns of green, of silver, of royal purple or gold. Whatever you wish.'