Out of the Dark

by JoAnn Smith Ainsworth

  She’d just have to trust him. For now.

  “Wilfgive of Osfrith. The Rose Chamber.”

  Basil was fuming.

  She’s stubborn, closed mouth and fighting me at every turn. She’s too independent for her own good. She acts as if we’re at war and everything is a state secret.

  He’d gotten her name, but only after convincing her that, since he knew her father’s name, it would be easy enough to inquire and learn hers.

  Basil’s frustration mounted with this blind woman whose fingertips lightly touched his forearm as he guided her out of the cellars. He was convinced there was more to her hiding than she’d admitted. Perhaps her virtue had been threatened. He was resentful that her lack of candor required him to set aside the king’s investigation to see to her safety. Many sheriffs would ignore the plight of a Saxon, but Basil was taught by monks. He’d see justice done.

  Reaching the level for the Rose Chamber, he stepped out of the stairwell. Because she irritated him by her intransigence, he wasn’t feeling particularly accommodating and deliberately, without warning, turned the corner abruptly into her corridor. He was astounded when she easily followed.

  Still stupefied, he gradually became aware she was speaking.

  “And so you see, my parents won’t take kindly to my being lost. I can make it on my own from here.”

  “I never leave a lady alone and unprotected.”

  She looked annoyed.

  “You’d save me a lot of trouble. They’ll not be happy with me.”

  “Your father and mother deserve to know you’re safe.”

  She clutched his arm.

  “Take me to my chamber first. I’ll visit them as soon as I get cleaned up.”

  She sounded panicked, but he wasn’t budging. Although he no longer believed her a thief, he’d keep digging until he learned the mystery behind her hiding under a wooden crate. If parental anger would release her tongue, so be it.

  Basil stopped at the door of the Rose Chamber and raised his hand to knock.

  “Answer me truthfully and I’ll consider taking you to your chamber. What did those men do to you?”

  She hunched her shoulders and gritted her teeth.

  “Nothing.”

  The sheriff knocked loudly.

  Her richly-dressed father answered the door and Basil saw he looked puzzled upon seeing his untidy daughter.

  “My dear, what happened?”

  Lynnet was wringing her hands.

  “I got lost in the cellars.”

  And more than that, if only she’d say.

  “I am Basil of Ipswich, Sheriff of London. I found your daughter…”

  “There’s no problem, Father, although I must look a fright.”

  She presented her parents to him with formal introductions.

  Her mother advanced on them, her face scornful. Lady Durwyn towered over both Lord Wilfgive and Lady Lynnet, her back upright and rigid as she chastised her daughter.

  “You should know better than to wander off.”

  Other than the father’s first words, Basil picked up no sense of caring directed towards the daughter.

  No wonder she pleaded to clean up first.

  “I’m concerned about your daughter. She was…”

  “I was trying to find my way back,” Lady Lynnet broke in. “I tripped over some potatoes and got scraped up. It’s minor. Don’t worry.”

  So that’s how the potatoes got spilled.

  “I’ve been trying to ask your daughter…”

  Her mother shooed him out the door, her hands driving him away as if controlling a flock of chickens.

  “Not now, Sheriff. I’ll not have you questioning our daughter while she looks a disgrace.”

  He shook his head at the ill-mannered audacity of the woman.

  Lady Durwyn pointed to the right, a rose-colored silk sleeve cascading downward from her outstretched arm.

  “Knock next door and tell that servant to get over here fast if she knows what’s good for her.”

  Basil watched, astounded, as the Rose Chamber door shut in his face.

  “I’ll play their lackey today,” he grumbled as he approached the daughter’s chamber door, “only because I must get back to the king’s business. Eventually I’ll find out what happened in the cellars.”

  “God’s truth, I don’t care what your parents said or did, you shouldn’t have run off.”

  Evelyn, her companion, personal servant and friend since she lost her sight as a child, was upset with her.

  “It’s not like I thought about it. It just happened.”

  Lynnet was sitting on a stool. Her companion had arranged a basin of soapy water, a cloth and towel and her hairbrush on the table. She detected the faint hint of rosewater added to the water. A fresh set of clean clothing lay next to the basin. The pot of stew warming on the fireplace hook made her mouth water and her stomach growl with hunger.

  Lynnet heard Evelyn dip the linen cloth into the basin of water. She sat still, allowing her companion to wash the grime off her face and hands. Evelyn took advantage of their friendship to scold.

  “Look at you. You’re all dirty and your clothing is twisted about. You look more like a street waif than the lady you are.”

  “It was dirty down there.”

  She hadn’t told anyone about her experiences in the cellars, only that she’d gotten lost. With the sheriff standing nearby, she’d held off telling her parents what she’d overheard even though it might affect the king.

  The problem was she wasn’t certain she’d heard correctly. The cellars distorted sounds. Then too, although the sheriff worked for the king, it was possible the three men were pledged to the crown as well. If they were corrupt, who was to say the sheriff was not corrupt.

  The opportunity passed when her mother ordered the sheriff to summon Evelyn to get their daughter cleaned up and looking respectable.

  Evelyn removed the netting with capable fingers and started brushing Lynnet’s waist-length hair.

  “What did your mother and father do this time to upset you?”

  “The usual. Arguing—as if I’m not there—on the best way to marry me off and still keep our wealth intact.”

  Lynnet’s mother was first cousin to the late queen. In Lady Durwyn’s mind, the only hope for a suitable marriage was her daughter’s superior breeding and family wealth. Even though her father’s Wessex lands were appropriated by King William after the Battle of Hastings, the family still retained considerable wealth through her mother’s Scottish estates. And she didn’t let them forget it.

  At seventeen, Lynnet was nearing spinsterhood. If her parents died while she was still unmarried, the king, as her guardian, might settle her in a nunnery and transfer her inheritance to a male relative. Or confiscate it for himself. Her parents wanted no excuse to transfer more lands into Norman hands.

  “Once again, my mother was pointing out my inferiority as a marriage prospect because of my lack of vision.”

  The mere thought of this old argument made her skin crawl.

  Her companion clucked her tongue.

  “They don’t know you like I do. Any man would be blessed to have you as his wife.”

  At the time disease stole her sight, chickenpox claimed her older brother’s life and severely pock-marked her father. Her high-born parents never recovered. Embittered, they grieved that their only surviving child was female and flawed.

  Illness cooled family relations with the crown. Normans were blamed for the tragedy since a foreign delegation brought the chickenpox. It was in the Tower that disease spread, devastating her family.

  The scarring it caused was more than skin deep. After the Saxon Queen died, their visits devolved into a despised duty, tolerated only because the family could not be seen as snubbing a Norman king. Her mother’s cherished desire was to live on her own lands where Saxon superiority was well established and no one dared slight her.

  Evelyn finished the brushing and was braiding her hair.<
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  “As soon as my parents can get away from this duty of attending court, they’ll return home and find me a suitable husband of pure Anglo-Saxon descent.”

  Lynnet wanted none of this. If she had to live with diminished sight, she at least deserved a man she cared for in her marriage bed. Not one only interested in wealth and social standing.

  “What are my chances of finding a man to love at winter court?” she asked Evelyn. “Someone acceptable to my parents?”

  “Naught.”

  The conspirators spoke quietly in a dark corner while guests mingled in the Great Hall, awaiting the king’s arrival and the announcement to be seated for the evening meal.

  “I overheard the father say that his daughter became lost in the cellars today.”

  The whiny voice of Count Maximilian de Selsey sounded anxious.

  “So you were right,” Sir André de Chester said, the flickering torch light reflecting from his thick, blond hair and emphasizing his hooked nose. “Someone was in the storeroom. It wasn’t just the cat as Courbet insisted.”

  “I wonder where she was hiding? The Sheriff of London found her, blast his miserable, interfering hide.”

  André smirked.

  “My half-brother has a habit of sticking his nose in where it doesn’t belong.”

  André scratched his goateed chin as he looked around. The king’s favorite hounds slept under the oak table where golden goblets marked the places for the king and his daughter. Hundreds of candles and torches lit walls hung with gigantic tapestries to dampen the cold. Fresh straw and evergreen needles covered the wide pavement stones on the floor, masking the stench from yesterday’s rotting food droppings and animal feces. Minstrels played lyres and pipes from a mezzanine balcony.

  “Which one is she?”

  André flexed his muscles threateningly, making Maximilian anxious. His co-conspirator had a handsome face, but a black heart.

  Maximilian gestured towards the opposite wall of the high vaulted Grand Hall. André had the height and breadth to make him feel inferior and Maximilian resented him for it.

  “The one sitting on that bench in the shadows. She’s blind. It doesn’t matter that she sits where there’s no light.”

  André smiled.

  “Blind? Christ Jesus, that is providential for us. Has she spoken? Do we know if she overheard?”

  “Not even a whisper. My Anglo-Saxon sister-in-law is a friend of the woman. I visited and heard no gossip.”

  “Good. No one must learn of our plans.”

  “She may not have heard a thing. The storeroom is far from our meeting place.”

  “A pox on this king,” André said. “We made it look as if rebel Saxons are robbing his tax collectors and stealing his grain. His father would’ve taken an army out to slaughter them by now.”

  André’s face darkened in anger. “To rid this land of the Anglo-Saxons, we may have to forcibly free his weak-kneed brother from Henry’s imprisonment.”

  “We can bring him home from France to take over the kingdom.”

  Sir André straightened and stared across the Great Hall at Lady Lynnet.

  “We’ll have to make sure she doesn’t talk.”

  Maximilian’s stomach clenched. “No killings,” he hissed. “Not in the king’s residence. We’re in deep enough as it is.”

  Lynnet had been uncertain all afternoon whether to involve her parents in what she overheard. She struggled with it all through evening meal. Now, they were back in their Tower chambers and she was decided.

  “Father, Mother, I have to tell you what happened this morning.”

  As her mother turned against the candlelight, Lynnet saw by her outline that she still wore a tall, silken coif to cover her graying hair. Her parents believed in making a show of their wealth whenever they appeared in public.

  “We know what happened,” her mother said, sounding exasperated. “You got yourself lost just like we predicted.” Her mother heaved a long sigh. “It’s about time you learn to accept your limitations.”

  Lynnet dug her heels in. She lay a hand on her crystal pendant, rubbing it between thumb and forefinger to sustain her courage.

  “I overheard some men talking. I think they’re plotting against the king.”

  “Another flight of fancy, Daughter?” Her mother’s tongue sounded sharp and unkind. “You’re always seeing people who aren’t there.”

  “It’s our fault,” her father said, sounding weary. “We overeducated her to compensate for her infirmity. Her imagination gets overheated.”

  Lynnet wrung her hands, hoping to find the words to convince her parents.

  “This is real, Father. There were three of them. I only heard a few words, but they talked of chaos in the kingdom.”

  “Who were these men?” her father asked. “Were they Norman or Saxon? If they’re Saxon, I might join them.”

  He emitted a bitter, mocking laugh.

  Lynnet could see her oversized mother bearing down on him as her petite father cringed back into his chair.

  “Husband, do not speak those words, even in jest.”

  Lynnet tried to divert her mother’s attention.

  “Their accents were Norman. Although they used no names, I’d recognize their voices. They must be of some consequence. They wore armor.”

  Her mother turned away from her cringing father to confront Lynnet. Planting her fists on her hips, she made a formidable opponent outlined by candlelight. Lynnet could feel the anger pouring out of her.

  “Don’t get us embroiled in politics.”

  “She’s right, Daughter.” Her intellectual father’s voice was conciliatory.

  “Speak no more of this,” her mother insisted. “It’s hard enough for Saxons these days. Don’t make matters worse.”

  Chapter Two

  Lynnet was locking her chamber door for a midmorning visit with Matilda when she heard heavy boots running towards her. Before she could react, a smelly, masculine hand clasped over her mouth. Two more strong hands imprisoned her arms behind her back.

  “Grab her legs. The little vixen kicked me.”

  “I’ll knock her out. It’ll be easier to wrap her in the rug.”

  A fist struck underneath Lynnet’s chin, making her teeth rattle together and threatening to slam the insides of her head into the bony walls of her skull. The pain was horrendous before blackness descended.

  The sheriff had been working up a sweat since dawn. In the wee hours, he had commandeered a scribe and two muscled retainers from the king’s Tower staff. Rather than just overseeing the workers as most sheriffs would do, he pitched in to shift the weighty crates and barrels.

  He liked putting his muscled body to the test and felt a camaraderie with these men. As a boy, he unloaded provisions from carts for an Ipswich innkeeper. The work reminded him of his youth and of his tavern barmaid mother, whom he still saw occasionally. On top of that, the Saxon beauty had been on his mind frequently since yesterday. While still smarting from his abrupt dismissal, he had trouble getting those blind light-blue eyes out of his thoughts. Working up a sweat while counting supplies kept him occupied enough to forget—occasionally.

  Receiving this commission was a complete surprise. When summoned by the king yesterday morning, Basil expected chastisement. Relief had flooded through him when he realized his latest brawl with his wealthy half-brother would not land him in his own jail. Although Basil’s post as Sheriff of London bespoke the political power of his father, the Earl of Chester, Basil knew his illegitimacy would put him on the losing side in a face-off with his vindictive half-brother, his father’s legitimate, youngest son.

  Stopping the thievery would be a challenge. This London residence and fortress was built by King William only a few years after securing his rightful place as ruler of Britain. Besides the garrisoned soldiers and the Lord Chamberlain’s housekeeping staff, dozens of tradesmen, craftsmen, entertainers and even farmers who slept within its walls each evening were in and out of the Towe
r gates many times throughout the day. Although the outer walls were heavily guarded, until now there was free movement within the walls. Basil was going to put a stop to that.

  He wiped the sweat from his face with his sleeve.

  Starting at one end of the cellar and slowly working towards the other, he had inventoried the king’s provisions to establish what was being stolen, when they were taken, and just how much was taken. He would repeat these inventories frequently to discover the pattern behind the thefts. His spies were out in the markets looking for the foodstuffs being sold there.

  Basil smiled grimly.

  I’ll get to the bottom of these thefts!

  Lynnet gradually recovered her senses. She willed the cobwebs to disappear from her throbbing head. Hearing scurrying sounds she suspected as being rats, Lynnet decided she must be in the cellars again. No other sounds penetrated the cold, dank atmosphere. Her attackers were gone.

  Because she was not already dead, she decided the conspirators had probably secreted her here until they could transport her out of the Tower, perhaps hidden in some peddler’s cart. Or was she already smuggled out?

  Her stomach clenched and she prayed she was still in the Tower. She’d have a better chance of surviving. She wondered if the sheriff had anything to do with her present misfortune. Anger built in her belly and its warmth spread outward.

  God rot their entrails.

  Ignoring a throbbing head and restricted breathing, Lynnet struggled against her bindings, but made little headway at loosening them. Her body was bound tightly in the putrid-smelling rug the attacker had thrown around her. The rough cloth pressed against her face and fastened her arms snugly to her sides, restricting her down to her toes. Lynnet decided to roll herself out of it.

  She rolled to her right, but good fortune eluded her. Lynnet rolled the opposite way and felt relieved when the dirty, mildewed rug layered off her. She sneezed, blowing away dust caked under her nose.

  “I’m fortunate they didn’t fasten it with cords,” she mumbled to herself as she checked her bearings.

  Darkness surrounded her. No lit torches gave her an inkling as to direction.