A Powerful Little Love

Chapter 36

I see the boys of summer

Dylan Thomas, 1914 - 1953

...I see that from these boys shall men of nothing

Stature by seedy shifting,

Or lame the air with leaping from its heats;

There from their hearts the dogdayed pulse

Of love and light bursts in their throats.

O see the pulse of summer in the ice....

...But seasons must be challenged or they totter

Into a chiming quarter

Where, punctual as death, we ring the stars;

There, in his night, the black-tongued bells

The sleepy man of winter pulls,

Nor blows back moon-and-midnight as she blows...

...I see you boys of summer in your ruin.

Man in his maggot's barren.

And boys are full and foreign to the pouch.

I am the man your father was.

We are the sons of flint and pitch.

O see the poles are kissing as they cross.

"Winter will never come for the likes of us. Should we die in battle, they will surely sing of us, and it's always summer in the songs. In the songs all knights are gallant, all maids are beautiful, and the sun is always shining." — Brienne, A Clash of Kings

The knot in Amorette's stomach grew tighter and tighter the closer they got to her home in Provins. She and Tilda arrived just as the sun was setting on the horizon. There were a few minutes more of a strange sort of muted daylight with the pale half-moon barely visible against the violet coloured, cloudless sky before darkness enveloped them. The night was strangely comforting to Amorette. With the darkness came the comfort and knowledge that this meeting of English nobles had yet to take place and was in fact days away. Amorette felt now more than ever that she may have made a mistake in agreeing to meet with the plotters but there was nothing that could be done to prevent it now.

During their journey, it had crossed Amorette's mind that she should feel within her some sort of guilt for betraying her English heritage. Her father was English after all, with lineage that he could trace back through some of England and Scotland's most noble families. Amorette had no care for her father, and hadn't for many years but she did have English cousins who she felt some sort of obligation to. It was not a strong familial bond, but it was something at least. Amorette did not feel shaken at all by the fact that she was siding with France though. England in the form of her father had given her nothing but pain and misery. Whilst her cousins and English friends had not themselves done Amorette wrong they had not exerted their power to help her when she had needed it most. Her father was still controlling aspects of her life even now, whether she admitted it or not. Lord Barclay was still able to frighten her even when he resided across the channel. Granted, Buckingham had driven Amorette's father away from her many times in the last lot of years but when she was a young girl her friend had done little to help her. No one had dared to stand up against her father eleven years ago when Amorette's mother was ill and she was at the complete mercy of her father. Even Buckingham had steered clear of any direct conflict with Lord Barclay.

For that, Amorette would always be cautious of one of her closest friends. She knew in her heart of hearts that Buckingham hadn't really had any choice back then. His father held the title of Dukedom and left his son to frolic through English and French homes whilst he counted his coin. They had been close though, Amorette knew that. If Buckingham had only spoken to his father, something might have been done. In effect Amorette almost believed that she had held more power than Buckingham in those days. When her mother died, Amorette was suddenly thrust into this new world of prosperity. The title and property afforded to her meant that she was no longer under her father's thumb. Within days of the funeral Amorette had packed up all of her belongings and left her father's Chatau for the secluded one in Provins. Having sole ownership of the home meant that Amorette was responsible for herself entirely. Her father could no longer attempt to force her to marry someone of his choosing or lock her away from prospective suitors entirely. Over the years, his want of a respectable marriage for his daughter had wavered considerably. Often Amorette's father would refuse a perfectly good marriage prospect and back then Amorette would not have understood why, but now she was beginning to see things perfectly.