Eleanor gestured towards the door, as she knew we didn’t have long. I signalled for the two to escape and I would stay. Edward was not very happy to leave me but I made a show of pushing them towards the doorway, pushed them both through it and closed it as silently as I could, then I sat down on the floor where Eleanor had been sitting before we came in.
I didn’t know what I was going to do when the Baron came back, all I knew was that poor girl had been in this smelly room for long enough and Edward knew the way out and back to the castle and help.
I don’t know how long I sat thinking all of this, but I heard a noise of someone coming down the passageway towards the room I was in. Ready for my Oscar-nominated acting performance, I thought as I gulped down my nerves. The door was pushed open and the opening was filled by the shape of a very large man wearing a long red cloak.
“Are you still snivelling, child?” The Baron looked at me with a hard glint in his eyes. “I really think there should be no more tears left, my Lady,” he snarled and I was suddenly aware of his smell. He was the one who had pushed me from my horse, he was the one whose odour I had smelt in the corridor behind the wall hanging in the castle. He was the steward at the castle, supposed to be a servant of the King, but I suspected he was plotting an overthrow of his King and was therefore a traitor.
“I demand to get back to my father.” I looked him in the eyes with more strength than I actually felt. “I am not sure how long I have been here and he will be frantic about my going missing.”
“Ha, your father and all around him think you were missing for just a day. Somehow, young miss, another Eleanor has taken your place and I need to find out who she is and how she got here. You will remain in this room until I can find out the answers.” He really was a nasty pasty.
“Another Eleanor, how can that be, but my father,” I snivelled, acting as best I could, all the while thinking I must take a place in the drama club when I got back to school.
He crossed the room and lifted his arm to hit me, I guessed to try to stop my crying.
“If you lay a finger on me again, my father will have you hunted and killed.” I drew myself to my full height, almost to his shoulder. “You are not so high and mighty and I have friends in high places who will make you pay for what you have done.”
This outburst stopped the Baron mid-action and he took a step back. “My, my, finally you are showing your teeth and acting like the daughter of a Lord.”
“I have been mistreated by you for long enough, you will release me and perhaps my ‘father’ will forgive you in time.” Fingers crossed behind my back, something I always did when I told a porky pie.
With as much haughtiness as I could muster, I held my head high and made my way towards the door. The Baron lunged and was there before me, laughing at my presumption.
“Ah, I think not my Lady.” He bowed low, pushing me backwards where I fell on the floor and was out of the door shutting it hard behind him with a cruel laugh. I then heard a sound I didn’t like one bit: the sound of a key turning in the lock of the door. I didn’t remember us turning a key, didn’t remember there being a key when Edward and I opened the door. It did seem strange looking back that the door wasn’t locked; I mean, if you were keeping someone a prisoner then it made sense to lock them in their prison. Anyway, I was well and truly a prisoner now, locked in good and proper. I hoped Edward and Eleanor had managed to escape back to the castle and raise the alarm as I started to feel more than a little afraid – a new experience for me, and one I did not like.
I sat on the floor for a while as the room became dark and listened for any noise that might mean hope. All I heard was a light scuffling in a corner of the room, I hoped it was a mouse and not a rat.
The room was quite dark now and I wondered what the Baron was up to. Had he captured Edward and Eleanor, or had they raised the alarm? I always tried to be a positive person but it seemed like an age since they left me and the more I thought, the more I came to the conclusion they had been captured. It was then that I heard a noise other than the mouse-rat-like noise. This new noise was loud, outside, like the rumble of thunder coming closer. There wasn’t a window in the room to find out what it was, I was completely in the dark. All I had with me was my hope that it was my rescuers.
Outside the house, Edward led a procession of guards from the castle. This was what I found out later, much later after all the excitement, which I had missed out on, being locked in the room.
Evidently, Edward and Eleanor had escaped, following a hairy moment in the house when one of the Baron’s cohorts almost discovered them as they left the courtyard. They ran as fast as they could back through the streets until they reached the castle. When they arrived back, they found Sir Kay and the Queen still talking in the main hall. This meant we could not have been gone for more than an hour. Time really does take on a new meaning when the situations you find yourself in can make it either fly or drag.
Edward then quickly explained to his mother what had happened and Eleanor (the real Eleanor) gave both the Queen and Sir Kay a big hug. They told her how brave she had been and then asked where I was now. Things then started to happen very quickly. Sir Kay left the hall and gathered the guards together in the courtyard of the castle. The Queen took the real Eleanor to her chambers where no doubt she was cleaned and fed and watered. Edward followed Sir Kay and soon the small army of men were on their way to find the house where I was held captive.
They arrived at the house and Edward dismounted and opened the gate for the guards, led by Sir Kay with his sword at the ready, to enter. The noises I then heard were the noises of a scuffle; the Baron’s men put up a fight but were eventually captured by Sir Kay and two of the guards, but the Baron was not with them. He had escaped. Edward left Sir Kay with the fight and made his way to the room where I was held. He unlocked the heavy door and pushed it open. I was up from the floor as soon as I heard the commotion and out of the door as soon as Edward had it open. I hadn’t been a prisoner for long but it was an experience I didn’t want to go through again.
We left the room and made our way to the outside where I looked in awe at Sir Kay, who had two men tied together in a state of nervousness. He looked at me with a look of joy, which quickly changed to a look of being slightly cross, then back to looking at me with a look of total exasperation. I laughed at him but knew I was in for a lecture when we arrived back at the castle. Edward and I mounted his horse together, me in my usual place at his back which I gave a hug to when I was up behind him, and we rode back to the castle to relay the adventure to the Queen.
The Queen was restlessly pacing the main hall when we arrived. She came towards me and gathered me to her, then her son. Sir Kay was awarded one of her amazing smiles.
“Sir Kay, thank you for returning them to me, I have spent the last hour in agony wondering what might be happening.” She spoke in English to him, then turned to me and spoke to me in French.
“Eleanor, I am still going to call you by that name as Lady Eleanor is resting after her ordeal and the Court here is not ready for finding out there are two of you. I have decided to keep you in your position while we figure out a way to find out where the Baron is and how we can find and then capture him.” The Queen looked to Sir Kay and switched back seamlessly into English.
“Sir Kay, I need to know exactly what has happened and then we can question the two prisoners, they may know where he has gone.” Then she looked at her son but continued in English for Sir Kay to understand what she said.
“Edward, you are to be the next King and must not go off like this again. What will I do with your father away and you getting into these kinds of scrapes? You must take your responsibility seriously,” she chastised him gently.
“Your Majesty.” I found my voice to speak in his defence. “Edward was looking out for the welfare of his friend, he knows about his responsibility to the Crown but he also knows he loves his friend, is loyal as a friend and needed to find and rescue her.”<
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“Thank you Eleanor, but I can fight my own battles, especially with my mother.” Edward walked towards his mother as he spoke. “I know my responsibilities to my birth and my father the King, but I will always be there for my friends, mother, and will never shirk my responsibilities as a friend.”
“Well said your Highness!” Sir Kay piped up. “The rules of chivalry are alive and well.”
With that, the Queen sighed, and leading us all to where a large fire blazed, sat down in her carved chair. She gathered us all around her. Edward and I sat at her feet, she gestured to Sir Kay to sit opposite and then declared that we tell her everything that happened when they rescued Eleanor.
Edward started by telling his mother how the three of us followed the Baron earlier that day after finding the secret corridor and discovering the house where we assumed Eleanor was being held prisoner. How Sir Kay used a circle of stones to mark the house so we would remember where it was. He explained how we were suspicious of the Baron for not only the kidnapping of Eleanor, but that he may be a traitor to the King. All of the time Edward was speaking, I was thinking. I wondered what my role in all of this was, why was I here, why had I been brought back from my time. I knew I would need to make another visit to the wise woman to have my questions answered. Meanwhile Edward had got to the part where the guards and Sir Kay set upon the Baron’s men and I sat enthralled by the account of Sir Kay’s bravery, how he with his single-handed sword overcame them, knocking one to the ground, before glancing the other a blow that made him lose his sword. The brigand then cornered Sir Kay and it looked as though it may be all over, but one of the guards threw Sir Kay their sword and they set to in a fight that ended when the brigand was overpowered. Sir Kay then tied them together and it was then that they searched for the Baron; they found his horse missing so assumed he had escaped upon hearing the commotion of the approaching guards. There was a back exit from the courtyard that had escaped Sir Kay’s notice and he must have disappeared through that as they had ridden in to the front entrance.
The Queen listened to all of this and laid a hand on Edward’s shoulder when the part about the fighting was relayed. I felt proud of the way Sir Kay had overcome the two men, sorry to have missed the excitement of the fight, but relieved to find Edward rescuing me from that horrible, dark and bad smelling room.
“Edward, you must take control of this situation, we must interview the two prisoners to find out what they know of the Baron’s whereabouts.” The Queen spoke quietly and then addressed Sir Kay.
“Sir Kay, we need to find out exactly what is going on here. I think you are right to suspect treason, but what he is planning and when, we need to find out. I am going to take Eleanor with me to question the Lady Eleanor in my rooms while you find out what you can from the prisoners. Come, Eleanor.” With that I rose from her feet and followed her out of the main hall into a corridor leading towards the suite of rooms used by the Queen while in residence in the castle. We made our way to where Lady Eleanor was sitting at a table eating, and she rose when we entered the room.
“No my dear, continue, we will wait for you to finish, how are you feeling?” the Queen asked the Lady, who looked a lot cleaner than the last time I had seen her.
“I am finished, your Highness, I am feeling cleaner and well rested thank you,” the Lady Eleanor replied whilst making a deep curtsy for the Queen. She was dressed in a pale green gown that was too large for her but had been gathered into a black belt around her waist to make it fit. I noticed that Lady Eleanor was a similar size to me in height, but was much slimmer than both me and the Queen. “I thank your Highness for the loan of the gown.”
“Lady Eleanor, we need to find out exactly what happened to you when you were taken from your home, it is important we find all the information and then we can piece together and come to conclusions,” I enquired in my bossy voice.
“I will tell you everything I know. The Baron was not alone in his plans, he had two helpers, one in the home of my father and one here in York. I heard him planning many things against the King and to organise for Sir Kay to be ambushed en route to the King to stop the King from receiving an important message.” She was more like me than even the wise woman thought, speaking in my way, all out in one breath.
“Who was the helper in your home, my Lady?” I asked her. I had my suspicions but needed to have them confirmed.
“Glenda.” She confirmed my thoughts with the name of the one I suspected.
“Pray, who is Glenda?” asked the Queen.
“My nurse, put in that position by the Baron, she was to spy on my father and relay to the Baron all the plans of the King she could find out.” Lady Eleanor looked sadly at me while she spoke. “She fooled me, for that I won’t forgive myself.”
“If it’s any consolation my Lady, she fooled me too, apart from my suspicions after speaking with the wise woman that somebody inside your home helped the Baron to kidnap you. Glenda was the only name I could think of who would know where you were at all times. She looked very surprised when I showed up with Sir Kay, and couldn’t wait to get me bathed. At the time I thought I must be dirty and need washing, but she was really examining my body to check for any signs of my being held captive and escaping from the Baron.” It was all beginning to fall into place.
“Oh my dear, you poor thing.” The Queen gave the Lady Eleanor another of her big hugs. “You have been through so much.”
“I knew Edward or Sir Kay would rescue me your Highness, what I didn’t know was a girl like me would help.” Lady Eleanor addressed me. “Who are you and where did you come from?”
A reasonable set of questions given the circumstances, I thought. I would ask them myself if found in the same position. As to how I would answer them, well, luckily I was saved, as Edward entered the chamber. He bowed low to his mother, then to the Lady Eleanor, then to me. Funny, I thought, fancy a Prince bowing to me an ordinary girl from the twentieth century.
“Mother.” He spoke in French, he always seemed to speak to his mother in French apart from when Sir Kay was around. I apparently spoke fluent French in this time, along with the King, Queen and the real Lady Eleanor.
“Mother, we have questioned the prisoners and they eventually told us that the Baron is on his way to France. He is a French spy from their King Philip. They intend to invade the country and that is why my father had to leave. The French navy are heading for England and are probably now in battle in the channel. The message Sir Kay brought told of this and only just got here in time.” Edward looked his mother in the eyes whilst relaying this information. “May God go with him and our brave navy. I have sent guards to London with the order to ride like the wind to find him before he gets to port and across the sea. We need to capture him and find out who else is working with him to overthrow the King.”
Chapter 10
“Edward, this plot thickens.” I gave him a look which told him we had questioned the Lady Eleanor and had found out more information. We needed to talk but I could see from the Lady Eleanor’s drooping eyelids she was not fully rested and needed to sleep.
“Come, Edward, we must find Sir Kay and tell him what the Lady Eleanor has told us. Your Majesty, we must take our leave.” I curtsied to the Queen and Lady Eleanor and left them and Edward and I hurried back to the main hall.
“Oh Edward, the spy at the Lady Eleanor’s home was none other than her nurse, Glenda. She has been working for the Baron all the time, planted by him in Eleanor’s own home, to spy on Sir Kay and Eleanor’s father, to tell him of any plans the King may have. Poor Eleanor and her poor father, they may have passed unwittingly information against the King to the Baron and then on to the French.” I took another deep breath before another explanation.
“There is more. The ambush against Sir Kay was planned by the Baron. He arranged it so that Sir Kay would not manage to deliver the message to the King,” Edward stopped in his tracks, turned and looked straight at me.
“This man is a traitor a
nd a brigand, he must be stopped.” Edward sounded so angry, I had not heard him speak like that before and saw for a brief moment the vision of the man he was to become.
We eventually arrived back in the main hall and found Sir Kay, where I told him everything the Lady Eleanor had said, and when it came to the part about the Baron organising his ambush I watched his face drain of all colour. He shook his fist in the air before turning to us both.
“Edward, I hope those guards you sent can ride and capture the Baron, I feel I must go after them to make sure of it. Will you look after both Eleanors in my absence?” He gave my arm a squeeze.
“Sir Kay, the wise woman told us to stay together in this, if you go then I must go with you.” I didn’t really feel like another long horse ride to goodness knows where, and hoped it wouldn’t happen.
A loud noise came from the courtyard, like a thousand horses’ hooves galloping across the drawbridge. We hurriedly made our way outside. Not a thousand, but certainly a hundred horses with knights on their backs, foot soldiers carrying large axes, and at the head of this procession a very large red haired man wearing a crown, astride a white charger.
“Father,” I heard Edward cry out. “Father I am so very pleased to see you.” He made his way through the milling crowd and held onto his father’s armoured leg, looking up in admiration. The King dismounted and held his son at arm’s length.
It was then I noticed a man being held between two guards; it was only his muddied red cloak that gave him away. He looked shrunken compared to the last time I saw him. His knees were weak and it looked like he was being held up by the two guards. They had captured the Baron.
The King strode towards the doorway, head down, listening attentively to what Edward was telling him. I noticed Edward kept up with his father’s long strides. The King turned and beckoned me to follow them. He walked to the main hall and to the warm fire burning in the hearth, where he turned to warm his back on the flames.
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