faintly at the bottom of the stairs. My heart thuds into my ears, bringing my sour reflections to an abrupt end. His tread is labored and slow as he climbs the stairs, each step accompanied by a soft grunt of effort. A flickering arc of light that throws the beams of the roof into fleeting relief heralds his entrance.

At last he is come.

Light spills into the room, and I blink into the glare. A fine picture I must make, squinting into the light as I am, and, uneasy, I shift in my seat. Shadows play heavily upon my lord's face and I cannot read the expression writ there. Without so much as a word or look, he crosses to the foot of the bed. His steps weave acrossthe floor and blood rises to my cheeks at the thought that my lord has need of wine to buttress his resolve to bed his wife.

I swallow and turn away at the thought of wine-sodden breath and clumsy hands, a heavy body that will not rise. But, at the trembling of light upon the wall, I catch my lord's grimace as he lowers the candle to the long chest at the foot of the bed. His breath is not that of a man enfeebled with too much wine, but one drunk with exhaustion and pain, where the cost of each rise and fall of the breast cannot be fully paid. He leans heavily upon the tall bedpost and the hand that seeks to unbind his belt shakes with