Free Company of Liars by Karen Maitland Page B

would put their own comfort before that of an old man.
    ‘It's best I don't get too warm if I'm to take first watch. At my great age I'm likely to nod off if I get comfortable. But you should try and get as much rest as you can. You'll need all your strength come morning.’
    I hardly needed to urge her to sleep; her eyelids were already drooping with weariness.
    ‘Why don't you take off your veil and make yourself comfortable? Your husband won't mind, I'm sure. You'll stick yourself with the pins if you fall asleep with that on.’
    Her hand rapidly outlined the edges of the linen veil that framed her face, as if to reassure herself that it was still inplace. It was pinned to a barbette beneath her chin, concealing all of her hair save for a flaxen wisp at the temple. It was a curiously old-fashioned style for such a beautiful young woman. These days you only saw old women still wearing the barbette, seeing no reason to forsake something they had worn all their lives. But most were only to glad to be free of such a chafing restraint.
    ‘I can't… I don't need to take it off. I don't sleep lying down, because… of my baby. The bile rises if I lie flat,’ she added hastily.
    Osmond slipped his arm around her and she leaned back gratefully against his shoulder. Even if she didn't feel the pins, he would by morning; it took nearly a dozen to fasten a veil like that. But it seemed he would put up with anything to protect his new bride.
    She was not used to sleeping among strangers, that much was plain. She'd had a sheltered upbringing, but neither shyness nor modesty was an asset on the road. Did she, did either of them have any idea what they were facing out there? Had I once really been as naïve as them? When you are in love and you are young, you think that nothing life can throw at you is insurmountable. You think that together you can overcome anything. I prayed they would never come to know how swiftly life can divide you.
    The dancing orange flames cast huge grey shadows of us on to the wall of the cave, our every movement parodied in a grotesque form, like a mummers' play performed for our mockery. Our shadows poured into one another, so that monsters appeared with two shaggy heads. Humpbacked dragons curled in sleep and mermaids flicked their sinuous tails. Shadows are such insubstantial things, yet they are bigger than any of us.
    Zophiel sat upright against his boxes, his head lollinguncomfortably on his chest. He'd pay for that in the morning with a stiff neck, but I wasn't too sorry. Rodrigo lay stretched out, snoring, sleeping the untroubled sleep of the just. Adela and Osmond nestled against the wall of the cave, Adela's head snuggled against Osmond's shoulder as his arms cradled her.
    Jofre was curled up in the back of the cave as he had been all evening, but he was not asleep. The firelight glittered in his open eyes. He was watching Osmond and Adela. He couldn't take his eyes off them. And suddenly it dawned on me why he'd been so quiet all evening. It was not just the fear that Zophiel might mention the wager; the poor boy was in love. Why do the young have to fall in love at first sight and fall so hard? Adela and Osmond were newly married; what did Jofre think could possibly come of it? But the eternal triangle is as old as man himself. You might even say that Adam, Eve and God were the first, and look where that led. And in all those centuries of lovers' knots, no good ever came of it. But it was useless to warn him that it would only lead to pain. The young can believe in werewolves and mermaids, but not that the old have ever been in love.
    As I watched the still bodies of Adela and Osmond, Rodrigo and Jofre bathed in the soft red glow from the fire, I realized with a sudden rush of emptiness that I belonged to no one, and for the first time in many years, I felt terribly alone. I had thought that I wasn't afraid of death. I was old and I knew it was inevitable, but I had never given it a shape