Pausing, she tried to still her quickened breath, the sound from her lungs roaring in her ears. Her keen eye absorbed the sparse, familiar details: glossy elm floorboards, gilded by the light from a single candle burning on an oak coffer; a fire smoking fitfully in the wide, brick-lined fireplace. A long trestle table and benches dominated the hall; this was where the nuns ate and any guests that might join them. But now, the hall was completely empty. All was quiet.
Extracting two lumpy bags of gold coins from her satchel, Alinor dumped them on the carved-oak coffer beside the door, the money earned today from the sale of the nuns’ wheat. After her unwanted encounter with the Prince and his soldiers this morning, the remainder of the day had passed in a blur; she could scarcely remember the noise and bustle of the market, the bartering, of which Ralph had done the most. She had stood by and watched, her body shocked and reeling, her mind constantly playing the moment when a pair of powerful hands had grabbed at her waist and thrown her up against a hard, unyielding torso. The image taunted her, dragged on her senses. She had been useless at the market, no help at all.
Seizing a rush torch from an iron bracket, Alinor held the blazing twigs aloft as she crossed the hall diagonally, moving through a narrow arch in the far corner, twisting down a spiral staircase. She entered the storeroom below, full of earthenware pots, casks, sacks of flour, wriggling carefully through the clumsy towers of hessian bags, the stacked barrels, to reach another door that squeaked on its hinges as she dragged it open. Holding the spitting, crackling light aloft, she descended the steep, rickety steps. None of the nuns came down here; the cellars were a labyrinth of hidden chambers and torturous passageways, formed from the vaulted foundations of the original, much smaller, Priory. Only the hefty barrels of mead which the sisters needed occasionally were situated in the first shallow-arched alcove, close by the bottom of the steps.
Alinor was going further, down into the basement. She knew her way around these cellars. As a frequent visitor to the Priory, the nuns had offered her space in the vaults to hang and store her herbs. Long stalks, tied with bristly twine, hung from iron hooks in the ceiling, crispy flower heads rasping at her veil, scattering seeds as she moved along the corridor, careful to keep the flickering, spitting torch away from the precious harvest above. The nuns’ offer had been a godsend; after her stepmother had ordered a whole roomful of her herbs to be destroyed, claiming they were ‘the work of the Devil’, Alinor had been desperate to find another place to keep them. Any place away from her stepmother’s prying eyes. The nuns, friends of her mother, and now her, had come to her rescue and she repaid them in kind, using her tinctures and ointments to heal them, as well as the many villagers who came to her for help.
‘Bianca?’ Alinor called out quietly, pausing in front of one of the wide shallow arches. ‘It’s me.’ Her whisper echoed eerily around the limestone walls, stone the colour of pale honey. A cobweb tickled her cheek; she brushed it away. There was a rustle, the sound of breathing, and then a voice.
‘Alinor?’
She peeked inside the chamber, thrusting the light inside. The girl, Bianca, sat huddled in a blanket on the flagstone floor, blinking rapidly with the unexpected surge of light. The silver embroidery on the hemline of her gown winked and glistened, the rich silk fabric rippling out around her.
Thrusting the burning torch into an iron bracket on the wall, Alinor knelt down beside the maid. ‘I’m so sorry I left you alone for so long,’ she said. ‘I had to go to the market today, for the nuns...but here, I brought you some food.’ Delving into her baggy leather satchel, she extracted the packages she had bought, placing them on the uneven stone floor. ‘I hope it’s enough.’
Bianca placed her hand on Alinor’s shoulder. The hanging pearls decorating the silver circlet on her tawny hair bobbed with the slight movement. ‘It’s more than enough...you’ve...oh, what happened to your face?’ Her blue eyes flared open in horror at the mottled bruising on Alinor’s cheek, the dried blood. ‘Did she work out what happened, your stepmother? What you did?’
‘No, no, I haven’t seen her,’ Alinor reassured her.
‘Then what happened to you?’
‘It’s nothing,’ Alinor mumbled, drawing her stiff linen veil forward, a self-conscious gesture, embarrassed by the girl’s concern. She had managed to rewrap her wimple on the way to the market, so the bloodstained cloth was hidden. But nothing could conceal the damage on her cheek. A pair of sparkling midnight eyes, a teasing smile, flashed across her vision and she bit down on her bottom lip, hard. Do not think of it, do not think of him, she ordered herself sternly.
‘Looks like it was a bit more than nothing,’ Bianca said, frowning critically at Alinor’s face. ‘You’ve risked your neck for me already; please don’t take any more chances.’ She shifted her position on the blanket, her blue-silk overdress sliding over her knees. Hundreds of tiny seed pearls had been stitched into the curved neckline, matching the intricacy of the maid’s circlet and fine silk veil.
‘It wasn’t anything like that,’ Alinor said, untying the packages with brisk efficiency. ‘Ralph, you know, the lad from the village who went with me, and I, well, we ran into a bit of trouble on the way to market.’
‘Trouble?’
‘We crossed paths with Prince Edward and his entourage. And our cart had broken, so they couldn’t cross the bridge. Ralph went to fetch help and left me there.’ Her breathing quickened and she shook her head. ‘I was stupid, thinking I could brave it out against them. I should have run, hidden somewhere.’
‘Why didn’t you?’ Bianca asked softly.
‘I thought they would destroy all the grain, all the nuns’ profits. But, thankfully, I held them off until the Prince arrived.’ She closed her eyes briefly, remembering. The thick arms folded about her slim waist, thumbs splaying against her spine, pulling her close. The mail-coat links pressed through her clothes, digging into her soft flesh. The way his muscular legs bumped against her toes, flailing uselessly above the ground. Blue, blue eyes, sparking fire. A shivery breath gripped her lungs, surging, alive. ‘And then one of the knights grabbed me and carried me off the bridge, out of the way.’ She grimaced, balling her fists defiantly in her lap. ‘I put up a good fight though. I bit him.’ Her mouth tightened. ‘I bit his ear.’
‘Oh, Alinor!’ Bianca said, clapping her hands to her mouth. ‘So I suppose he walloped you for that?’
‘No, it was the Prince. I just kept on screaming.’ A delicate colour brushed her cheeks as she recalled her outrageous display. She shrugged her shoulders. ‘What was I supposed to do? Go quietly?’
Bianca laughed, dipping her head. ‘Alinor, I have only known you a short while, but something tells me you would never go quietly. What you have done for me...your bravery; I’m sure I wouldn’t have the courage to do the same. You were lucky, though. The Prince has a fearsome reputation; he could have killed you.’
It’s not him I’m worried about. She shifted uncomfortably, fiddling with the strings on the packages. She couldn’t seem to undo them, her hands clumsy, muddled. ‘Then thank God he didn’t.’ Alinor smiled wanly, her fingers tangling in the knotted strings. Sweet Jesu, the thought of that man was affecting her even though he was nowhere near! What was the matter with her? She wasn’t ever likely to see him again.
‘Here, let me do it,’ Bianca offered. ‘I’m starving and you’re taking too long.’ She opened up the squares of muslin to reveal fresh rounds of bread, lumps of crumbling cheese, an apple. ‘Oh, you’ve brought me a feast!’ She bit into one of the bread rolls. ‘This bread tastes like Heaven! Thank you Alinor, thank you for everything.’
Alinor smiled at her enthusiasm, the girl’s good humour despite her desperate situation. Bianca had arrived at Alinor’s home with an escort of French knights, sent by Queen Eleanor, King Henry’s wife, in order to marry Alinor’s stepbrother Eustace. A marriage arranged by the Queen, wit
h the Savoy family of Attalens in France, a marriage that could not be unarranged. Her stepmother disapproved of the match, violently disapproved, but how could she openly contest a queen’s edict? She wanted Eustace to marry Alinor, as Alinor was the sole inheritor of her father’s vast wealth, his many castles and estates. On her father’s death she would be a wealthy woman in her own right. And her stepmother would do anything for Eustace to have all that and, so it seemed, she would stop at nothing, nothing, to achieve that end.
‘Have you been able to find anyone to take me to the coast yet?’ Bianca widened her large blue eyes in question as she nibbled delicately at the cheese. ‘It was a shame your stepmother sent my escort away so quickly, otherwise they could have taken me back. And my poor maidservant as well, having to travel back with them!’
‘Wilhema wanted them all out of the way as quickly as possible. She didn’t want them to find out what she was planning for you,’ Alinor said. ‘But don’t worry, I have someone in mind to take you back to France, someone I can trust.’ Ralph, she thought to herself, or someone in his family. They would help. ‘Remember, you are supposed to be dead. Wilhelma truly believes that I did what she asked of me, that I poisoned you. If she, or one of her friends, should see you...’
‘It won’t happen; I can disguise myself.’ Bianca turned her mouth down ruefully. ‘I need to wear your lay sister’s clothes and possibly cut my hair, darken down the colour?’
‘Yes, all of those things. You cannot risk being recognised. But you must stay here for the moment; I promise, I won’t take long to ask my friend to take you home.’
‘I’m surprised you’re not offering to do it yourself,’ Bianca teased. ‘After all, you seem to demonstrate exceptional skill when it comes to dealing with potential attackers.’
Alinor laughed, touched her check self-consciously. ‘Don’t worry, he will be a proper escort.’
‘Just make sure he’s good looking,’ Bianca said. ‘That’s all I ask.’
Such a request seemed so idiotic in the face of the huge risks both girls were taking that they both dissolved into laughter, heads bobbing together in the flickering half-light.
* * *
Hiking up her skirts, Alinor scrambled on to the stone window ledge, angled deep into the infirmary wall. Standing, she reached for the ornate iron latch on the leaded window, pushing the casement open. Fresh air flooded the chamber, cutting through the fuggy, foetid air. The nuns’ hospital, a double-height building set apart from the Priory, held about twenty pallet beds, simply constructed and lifted a few inches from the flagstone floor by a block of wood at each end. Mattresses and pillowcases were stuffed with straw, which could easily be replaced; coarse linen sheets and a motley collection of woven blankets lay on top of each bed.
Only one of the beds was occupied at the moment. Sister Edith, one of the more elderly nuns, had come in a few days ago complaining of stomach pains, which had developed into vomiting and fever. Now she lay on her back in the bed, a motionless doll-like figure under a heap of blankets. She had stopped being sick, yet still she shivered, moaning occasionally. Alinor jumped down from the window ledge and moved over to her, dipping a flannel into a bowl of cool water beside the bed, and placing it gently across Edith’s forehead. She was worried about her; so worried that she had stayed the night at the convent, lying restlessly in the pallet bed next to her, alert and wakeful to Edith’s shallow breathing. She hadn’t even had time to visit Bianca today. She would go this evening, when there would be more sisters around to tend to Edith.
‘Any change?’ Maeve, the Prioress of Odstock, swept into the infirmary, flanked by two young novices. A tall, imposing woman, Maeve had a reputation for being strict, but fair. Alinor held a great deal of respect for her; the Prioress had held her mother in her arms as she had finally succumbed to the fever that had gripped her for days, and would help Alinor whenever she could. And in return, Alinor helped the nuns with her healing skills, learned from an early age at her mother’s knee; she even had her own bed at the Priory, which allowed her to come and go as she pleased.
Alinor tilted her head to one side. For a fleeting moment, she wondered what Maeve would say if she told her about the girl hidden in the cellars. But the Prioress was a stickler for rules; if she found out about the Queen’s wish for Bianca to marry Eustace, she would probably send the poor girl straight back to Alinor’s home and to her conniving stepmother. No, she couldn’t risk that. Helping Bianca leave the country was something she would have to do on her own, hopefully with Ralph’s help.
‘Have you put any ointment on that bruise yet?’ Maeve barked at her, her light-brown eyes swiftly assessing the patchy marks on Alinor’s cheek. The sparseness of her eyelashes made her facial features more prominent: a large, beak-like nose, the white expanse of lined forehead, shaved eyebrows.
‘Yes, yes, I have,’ Alinor reassured her. She had dabbed her cheek with foul-smelling unguent that very morning, when she had woken in the pallet bed next to the ailing nun.
Maeve peered at her critically. ‘It looks nasty. How did you say it happened again?’
‘I was stupid, I knocked it on one of the outposts of the cart, yesterday.’ She threw her a twisted smile. ‘As usual, I wasn’t looking where I was going.’
Maeve smiled. ‘Oh, Alinor, as clumsy as your mother was.’ She clasped her bony fingers in front of her swinging cross. ‘But also as good at selling. Your mother also knew how to drive a hard bargain. Thank you for all that coin; it will certainly keep us through the winter.’
And to think I nearly lost it all, thought Alinor. The risks I took. A hollowness suddenly emptied her stomach, the washcloth tightening between her fingers, drips running down on to the woollen blanket.
‘You look pale, Alinor. Go and fetch yourself something to eat; there’s food out in the refectory. I’ll watch Edith for a while.’ Maeve eased the washcloth from Alinor’s fingers and settled herself on the three-legged stool next to Edith’s bed.
‘I need to pick one other plant which might help her,’ Alinor said.
‘Fine, but don’t leave the Priory at the moment. There have been reports of fighting between the royalists and the rebels nearby. I wouldn’t want you to become caught up in something like that.’
A surcoat of red and gold surged in her mind’s eye; she dashed the vivid memory away. ‘No, I won’t go home today. I wanted to see how Edith fares.’ And to make sure Bianca leaves safely, she thought. Besides, she had no wish to return home to face her stepmother. She was better off at the Priory.
* * *
During the morning, the cloud had thickened steadily; the day was sunless, overcast, with a fitful breeze. As Alinor walked through the arch in the ivy-clad wall to the vegetable gardens, leaves chased along the cobbled path before her, silver-backed, yellowing, as if tossed by an unseen hand. A gust of wind eddied around her skirts, blowing them sideways, but after being cooped in with Edith all morning, she relished the fresh air against her skin. From a line of billowing oaks to the north, a gaggle of black crows flew up, sharply, wings beating furiously against the powerful currents of air.
Eyes watering in the cool air, Alinor strode briskly, past the neat rows of root vegetables: the carrots, turnips and swedes ready to be lifted and stored for winter. Her herb plot lay to the rear of the gardens; here, she grew the flowers and plants that went to make up her tinctures and ointments. Leaning over, she plucked several leaves of feverfew, and some mint as well, for flavour, stuffing them in the linen pouch that hung from her girdle.
‘Alinor! Alinor!’ Her name, carried along on the brisk breeze. Someone was calling her! Turning abruptly, she glanced back at the Priory windows and then over to the infirmary. A drab white veil blew out from the window; one of the novices was waving at her, yelling her name. Oh, God, she thought, it must be Edith! Alinor sprinted back across the gardens, her slender legs carrying h
er through the inner courtyard of the Priory, past the cloisters and out through a small arched doorway on the southern side which would lead her back to the infirmary.
She stopped.
Her heart clenched, squeezed with fear.
Fingers searching wildly behind her, she scrabbled, clutched at the door, the doorframe, the surrounding stone arch; anything that would give her some support, some stability. No, no, no! It couldn’t be! Her inner voice screamed denial even as her eyes told her what was true. Breath surged in her lungs; she sagged back against the cold stone. Before her, clustered in front of the infirmary was a group of about thirty knights, dusty, dirty, bloodied. Some sat on the ground, propped up by others, obviously wounded; others lay flat out on makeshift stretchers, faces drawn and white, eyes closed. Several soldiers held the large-muscled warhorses in a group, the animals obviously nervous, pawing the ground, enormous eyes rolling.
At the centre of the mêlée stood Prince Edward, head bent in conversation with the Prioress.
And him.
The broad-shouldered knight who had carried her kicking and screaming from the bridge, with his eyes of midnight blue, his shock of tawny hair. He was there.
Chapter Four
Fear spiked her veins; she rocked slightly, wondering if she could sink back into the shadows without anyone noticing her. But before she had the chance, Maeve turned her head, brown eyes homing in on the figure in the archway. Bony, arthritic fingers beckoned imperiously, signalling to Alinor. Straightening her spine, Alinor blundered out into the open, wobbling legs scarcely carrying her across the cropped wispy grass. These men wouldn’t recognise her, surely; even now, the other sisters were coming out to help, streaming out from the cloisters, from the chapel, all dressed in exactly the same way as Alinor. She would blend in, hidden amongst the rest of the nuns.
Edging her way through the soldiers, she reached Maeve. Prince Edward was already moving amongst his men, shouting orders, commanding the more able knights to carry the injured soldiers into the infirmary. Of the other knight, there was no immediate sign; Alinor kept her eyes pinned to Maeve, unwilling to twist her head and find him right behind her. Her muscles hummed with the strain of keeping herself held tightly in, wanting to remain unnoticed, slipping through this crowd of soldiers like a ghost.
Commanded by the French Duke (Harlequin Historical) Page 4