by Abby Gordon
“That could be a lot of reading, Anna,” warned Armand.
“As long as it's not Greek,” she retorted.
That had all of them laughing. Celeste hesitated and the Root caught her expression.
“Was there more, Celeste?”
“I’m not sure,” Celeste told her. “But Miles said you would want to know. It’s about my cousin Meggie. Weeks ago, her older sister Julia disappeared. My father returned from my uncle’s three days later saying that Edmund and his men had found Julia’s body. That Meggie had been slipping out at night to spend time with the men in the taverns. Edmund said Julia came to the tavern trying to get Meggie to return home and that Meggie urged one of his men to force himself on her and then kill her.”
“God’s Blood,” murmured the Root, pale as snow.
“I don’t believe it,” Celeste insisted, shaking her head, pleading with her eyes to be heard. “I doubted then and I’m more certain now that it isn’t the truth. Meggie is four months older than I, but she is very shy and hardly spoke around men she didn’t know. Julia was the bold and rash one, not Meggie. But Uncle Charles threw her out and Father forbade everyone at our manor not to speak with her or give her any comfort. We were to tell him if we saw her.”
“What do you think happened?” Now the Root’s voice sounded as hard as a diamond.
“I haven’t let myself think about what happened or where she is. If she’s even alive.”
“She’s alive,” Godfrey spoke up. “My Geoffrey found her freezing three weeks ago.” The approval Celeste had wanted and needed before was in his eyes now. “We hid her with the chickens at the rear of the yard.”
“Have him fetch her then and bring—”
Godfrey was shaking his head. “He went two days ago, and she was gone, Root Anna. We don’t know if they somehow got in and found her or if she ran away in fear.”
“Dammit,” she muttered, frowning as her hand tapped on the table. “Thank you, Celeste. What you’ve told me has been of immense help. Both in learning what has been happening in York, and where behavior needs to be corrected. Please, all of you go. Fetch those journals.”
George appeared at the door with two young women behind him.
“All secured, my lady,” he reported, grinning. “They’re not at all satisfied with their accommodations though.”
“Let them suffer,” she replied, glancing at the man to her right. “Oncle?”
“I’m feeling the journey,” he told her. “Ah, Rose, Mary. Is there a room an old man might rest his bones for an hour?”
“There is indeed, Root Raoul, with chilled wine and food waiting by the hearth,” Rose answered with a bright smile.
“Ah,” he beamed. “Sir Daffyd, hold onto this one.”
The slender blonde spoke next. “Lady Anna, we’ve done a bit of cleaning in the chamber they said was the Room of the Root. They’re fit enough for the night and –”
“Room of the Root,” she breathed, standing and running around the table. Confused, Celeste jumped out of the way as the Root came near.
“What?” The Shield stood as she ran from the room. “Anna! George, get after her.”
Without a word, the man took off as the Shield jumped over the table to go after his wife. The three Frenchmen laughed. Daffyd chuckled and shook his head as the trio came to the door.
“As fast as he is, I’ve never seen him move that quickly,” he observed. “Except when Eoin told us she’d been taken after the attack on the queen.”
“Attack on the queen?” Celeste gasped.
“Aye,” Daffyd nodded. “Shall we see if we can retrieve what the Root wants and be back before the others?”
Celeste grinned and nodded as Etienne and Armand protested.
“We have more places to go,” Armand reminded him.
“My father’s house is nearest Elder Gray’s,” she said. “We could go there as well.”
The Heirs exchanged glances then spoke to the Root in a language Celeste didn’t recognize. He replied, his eyes on her. They nodded.
“We all go together,” Etienne stated. “Sir Godfrey, where is your grandson? If we go also to your house or elsewhere she might hide, she might come out if she sees her cousin.”
“Could we try?” Celeste asked, hope rising that Meggie could be found.
“He’s down the stairs waiting,” the former captain told them. “I know he’ll be delighted to go with you. If I can get him to leave his sister,” he winked at the young woman standing close to Daffyd.
“Sister?” Celeste breathed, staring at the woman. I remember her. We played together but – “Rose? Is it really you? They told me you died of a fever after –” Closing her eyes, she wrapped her arms about Rose. “After the fire. Oh, God’s blood, how many have died because of them?”
“That is what Root Anna needs to find out,” the Norman Root told her. “The blood of many innocents cry out for Justice, Celeste. You can help her.”
“Yes,” Celeste whispered, nodding and straightening even as she smiled at Rose. “Especially if they had aught to do with Catalan. The woman I was named for was Root,” she breathed. Everything came together and she stared at the older man in shock. “They would have known her.”
“Let’s get the journals,” Armand prodded. “Quickly now. Enough talking.”
Without another word, Celeste turned and ran as quickly as she could down the hall and then the steps. Behind her she could hear the men assigned to escort her. Briefly, she saw the family members being ushered into a side room. She didn’t see either of her siblings.
“Aunt Anelle,” she suddenly realized, coming to a stop.
“Who?” Etienne asked, halting next to her.
“My uncle’s wife. No one has seen her since that awful day,” she replied, hurrying out the open double-doors and down the steps. “She would not even leave for worship.”
“We’ll bring her with us when we reach your uncle’s manor,” Armand promised, lifting her onto the saddle.
A Gascony Rose called out to him as he mounted, and Armand glanced around the courtyard. Celeste saw that it was full of both Roses and townspeople. Armand spoke to him in French and the man nodded, turning and running back inside.
“Shall we go?”
“Celeste,” Sir Jasper wondered, turning his horse for the gate. “What are we looking for?”
“Proof for the Justice of the Root,” she told him, catching the shock on his face before she brushed her heel to the mare.
Chapter Twenty-Two
George was at her heels as she ran down the hall. Owain’s furious oaths came closer. A smile curved her lips. Pausing, she waited for the men to catch up with her.
“Anna, dammit, for the love of angels will you –”
She threw her arms around his neck and kissed his cheek.
“Not everything of Grandfather’s was in the chest,” she whispered, seeing the comprehension in his eyes. With a nod, she smiled. “And Grandmother Alinor wouldn’t have known where to look.”
“Nothing hidden is going anywhere. Why could you not walk?” he demanded.
“Because I was excited,” she answered, smiling up at him. “Yes, I know. He told Mama and she told me.”
“Only Roots,” he deduced when she paused before the bedroom they’d been shown to by Geoffrey. “Right then. George, we’ll guard the door while she goes inside.”
Drawing his sword, the man nodded. Owain opened the door and looked inside before he would let her in. She didn’t protest that. He was her husband as well as her shield. When he looked down at her with a nod, his large hands framed her face, all the love in his eyes.
“I hope you find what you’re looking for, sweet,” he murmured, kissing her.
“I will,” she replied, certain of that.
Placing her hand on his chest for a moment she gazed up and felt the strength of him fill her. How do others live without love like this? Smiling, she slipped inside. He closed the door behind her, and she hea
rd the whisper of steel as he drew his sword. Standing still, she closed her eyes, murmuring the words her mother had made her memorize. Taking a deep breath, she opened her eyes and moved without hesitation across the room.
Phillipe ignored the English in the main hall. His Heir had given him a mission and nothing else mattered. He knew where the Roots and Heirs had met and that the chambers of the Root of York were along the same hall. Taking the stairs, he continued further, and his guess was confirmed when he saw the Shield and George standing outside a door. The Baron saw him and nodded.
“Is there anything amiss outside, Phillipe?” he asked as the Frenchman strode towards them.
“Lord Armand suggests that someone dismiss the Roses and townspeople until such time as Root Anna wishes to speak with them,” Phillipe said respectfully.
“Ah, excellent idea,” the Shield nodded. “George, will you trust me and the brother of Alicia to protect Anna while you go dismiss the York Roses and such until mid-afternoon tomorrow?”
The man grinned at the Shield. “Aye, I think you two I can trust to protect the lady.”
Nodding to the Gascon, he headed to the main hall. Phillipe frowned, shaking his head.
“The English Roses don’t meet with your approval, do they?” the Shield asked in a low voice.
“The courtesies toward a Root and Shield are definitely lacking,” he replied bluntly.
“We’ve been too long without either,” the Welshman reminded him. “There are few besides Godfrey who remember Root William. Or how one is to behave toward a Root. Much less a Lady Root,” he smiled. “Root Raoul and the Heirs have been instructing several of us on what is required. My lady knows but she is more concerned at the moment with rooting out the treason and decay.”
“Would the Shield be overly upset if Gascon or Norman Roses gave instruction to the Rose of York?” Phillipe wondered.
Sir Owain studied him, then slowly smiled. “No blood is to be spilled, nor bones broken. I think my lady would object strenuously to that. But I would not mind at all.”
Smiling, Phillipe nodded as the door opened. Anna had removed the elaborate dress she’d worn for her entrance in the Minster and was in her black ‘shadow’ clothes as her cousin Rose called them. That she had found cousins on her mother’s side pleased Phillipe. He knew how she’d grieved at Marco’s death four years earlier.
Then he saw what was in her hands.
“If any doubt who you are, let them see that for the first time in a generation or more,” he breathed, putting his right hand over his heart and bowing at the leather pouch studded with rubies.
“What is it?” Owain asked.
“The blade of the first Root of York and the ring of his Heir’s Protector,” Anna whispered in a reverent voice.
“Holy of holies,” breathed the Shield, eyes wide as she tied it to her waist. “Now I’m not sure if the double-roses and myself are protection enough for you.”
She smiled up at him, easily putting an arm around his waist. “Ah, but my wild Welsh warrior is enough on his own.”
“I shall die before anything harms you,” he vowed, gazing down at her.
“Phillipe, you’re not chastising the York Roses on the proper behavior before their Root?” she teased him, starting down the hall toward the meeting room.
“The Shield has given us leave to instruct them,” he replied solemnly but with a gleam in his eye.
“Has he indeed?” she said quietly, glancing at her husband.
“I said no blood or broken bones,” he smiled at her.
Chuckling, she shook her head and entered the room. Phillipe could see the wonder in her expression, the edge of disbelief that after a decade of hiding she was finally where she belonged. She went to the window and opened it, smiling as a brisk wind tugged at her hair.
“Mama spoke of how the breeze would quicken before a storm,” she told them. “And of how cold the air would be right before it snowed.” She swallowed. “I hadn’t seen snow before so I didn’t believe her. She even told me that the stars were the same, yet in different positions in the sky.”
Feeling like he was intruding on her grief, Phillipe glanced at the Shield and left the room, closing the door quietly behind him. Needing fresh air and solitude, he found an exit and went outside.
No one had seen her hiding in the Minster courtyard as the company rode in after the doors were closed. Meggie had debated whether to go to one of those holding the horses, but then the doors had been flung open. In shock she’d stared as her father, uncle and the other two Elders bound about their arms and legs were carried out then tossed into a wagon. Edmund was carried out by two men and put in as well. The wagon was surrounded by six men and driven out. Withdrawing back into the corner, she decided to wait.
Root of York? Rebellion? Treason? While others seemed full of righteous anger or horror, Meggie felt relief. Someone had gotten word to London. And by some miracle Lady Anna had survived the massacre. Then she saw her cousins, Ellie Gray and her two children, along with Edward Talbor. Mounted on their horses, they were surrounded by Roses and rode out. Straining to hear, Meggie caught part of the conversation – they were being taken to the manor of the Root.
Not certain who to trust with what she knew besides the Root, Meggie didn’t approach anyone. Slipping from her shelter, she stayed in the shadows until she reached the gate. Glancing over her shoulder, she hitched her bundle on her shoulder and started walking.
Walking, having to take alleys and the forest trails, Meggie finally reached the manor of the Root. She thought she saw Celeste riding back toward York with a group of men and prayed her cousin wasn’t a prisoner about to be executed. The main and side gate were well guarded, as were the walls so she went around to where she was certain not even a Root would think to have secure. Especially one new to York, new to her position. The men aren’t likely to follow her orders nor are they likely to concern themselves with one more beggar woman.
Going to the orchards in the rear, where she had scrounged apples, pears and roots, she went to where she’d found a break in the wall. Slipping through, she began pushing her way through the hedges around the rear garden. So intent on finding the weakest branches, she nearly impaled herself on the sword that suddenly appeared in front of her stomach.
Gasping, she froze as the point moved steadily upward to her chin, then lifted her face up until she met the stony expression of the man holding the sword. The rose at his throat wasn’t the scarlet of York but the peach of Gascony. Hard eyes studied her.
Hearing the thrashing in the hedges, Phillipe had drawn his sword. He didn’t think a threat would make so much noise, but it could be a distraction. Either way, he would dispatch it swiftly. From the soft grunts and muttered deprecations, he realized it was a woman and bit back his amusement at some of her words. Waiting at a point before her, he held out his sword, pulling it back slightly as she nearly ran upon it.
“And you are?” he demanded. Terrified, the woman, pale and thin, stared up at him. “Speak or I’ll run you through now.”
“Meggie,” she stammered. “I’m Meggie Black. I… I need to see the Root of York. She’s in danger.”
“Black? Are you of the families of the Elders?”
“I’m not sure,” she replied, tears filling her blue eyes. “My father threw me out some weeks ago because of lies Edmund Talbor told him. And they were lies,” she insisted. “I never did any of that. I swear by anything you want me to that I never did any of what he said.”
“What threat to the Root do you know of?”
“My father and the other Elders,” whispered Meggie. “They conspire with the earls and others against the queen. And… oh, please!” Daringly, she pushed aside his sword and reached for his hand. “We’re wasting time. Even now the earls are moving to seize the north. The Elders would kill the Root to keep her from stopping them. I must warn the Root. I know she’s not your Root, but please help me. York has been lost without a Root.” Dropping her
hand back to her side, her shoulders slumped and she bowed her head. “We’ve been so lost and lead astray by my father and uncle.”
Even though her information was known, Phillipe studied her in silence and considered more than what she had said. She has been sorely abused and terrified. Abandoned by her family. Yet she survived and had the heart to come forward.
“What lies did Edmund tell of you to have your father disown you?”
“Horrible things. Saying I’d been leaving the house at night, that I’d incited one of his men to…” She swallowed, shuddering. “To rape and murder my older sister.” Her chin came up. “I didn’t. I swear I didn’t. I begged Julia not to leave the house to meet Edmund, but she wouldn’t listen. She laughed at me. Father wouldn’t let me speak. He slapped me twice and sent me to my room.” Even holding the bundle, she hugged herself. “Then Father and Uncle Thomas and Elder Talbor left me alone with Edmund. Edmund seemed to know something about them. About something terrible my father and uncle had done.”
Phillipe felt his blood go cold. “Do you know what they did?”
“Yes, he told me because he thought he’d kill me,” she whispered. “Please. Can you take me to the Root?”
Sheathing his sword, he reached forward with both hands and lifted her free of the last branches. She weighs barely more than a child.
“Come,” he told her, a hand at her elbow and starting swiftly down the path.
She stumbled and fell to her hands and knees with a low cry. Without hesitation, he helped her to her feet, then scooped her up in his arms. Hurrying along the path, he emerged in view of the back of the manor and saw the Root and Shield still standing at the window. To his relief, the Shield turned in the direction of the door.
By the time he reached the rear entrance, Eoin was there, opening the door for him.
“Who is that?” the younger man wondered.
“She claims to be Meggie Black,” Phillipe replied, striding past to the back stairs. “Tell Root Anna.”
Eoin rushed past him, taking the steps two at a time. By the time Phillipe reached the second floor, Root Anna and the Shield were waiting at the door. The Root reached out and gently touched the thin cheek.