by Tamara Leigh
“Forgive me, Nicola.” He looked to the young woman alongside whom Mary Sarah halted. “I forget myself, which is irresponsible for one in my position and disrespectful of my training.” His eyes returned to Lillefarne’s abbess, and she knew he gave her space in which to own to the same.
“Apologies, Nicola,” she said. “And now we ought go to the infirmary. Godspeed your journey, Sir Maël.”
“There is a matter I wish to discuss with you, Abbess.”
Struggling to mask alarm and fear over what should not surprise since he had not departed following delivery of Nicola, she looked back. “Would that I had the time, but I am long gone from the children who arrived this morn following a brutal journey across scorched earth.”
“How many are there?” Nicola asked.
“Eleven, the youngest barely four years of age.”
“Poor little ones.” Nicola looked to her cousin. “Perhaps you could speak with the abbess in the infirmary.”
“Lady Nicola!” Mary Sarah snapped. “It is not for you to invite a man to move among a community of women.”
“Forgive me. I thought…well, since I know my cousin to be honorable, and other men enter here—”
“Others trusted by me,” Mary Sarah said, referencing those who supplied the abbey with necessities and repaired what its residents could not, those of God who sought verification Lillefarne maintained its standing as a house of God, the physician who tended serious illnesses, and the one who had fallen asleep in her apartment.
“But in this matter,” she continued, “of greatest concern is exposing traumatized children to a man whose Norman appearance and speech will further frighten them.”
Nicola gasped. “I did not think there. Now I am the one who seeks forgiveness.” She looked to her cousin. “I believe the abbess is right.”
He inclined his head, and once more Mary Sarah thought she glimpsed relief. Hopefully, here evidence he still possessed enough humanity to be discomfited by the prospect of looking close on those whose suffering was dealt by the tyrant he protected. “Aid the abbess,” he said. “Afterward, I shall speak with her.”
Mary Sarah nearly screeched. “You will not, Sir Maël. Godspeed.” Resuming her course, she called, “Come, Lady Nicola.”
Now to set her mind on the children, of little difficulty once she entered the room lit with few candles and whose curtains were drawn to encourage its occupants to sleep and heal. Many of the youngest ones did so, but few of the youths who had suffered more for sacrifices made to ensure survival of the most vulnerable among them.
It proving necessary to shear lice-infested hair and scrub vermin from their scalps, it was difficult to tell the difference between boys and girls attended by novices who moved pallet to pallet offering spoonfuls of soup and sips of milk. Too, since it was also necessary to burn what remained of their clothes, all wore oversized shifts.
“Where shall I begin?” Nicola said.
“The wee one fretting in the corner.” Mary Sarah nodded at where he—or she—snuffled around a thumb.
The young woman hesitated, said, “I know I overstepped with my cousin and did not think well on how the children would react. Aunt Chanson is right—I am impulsive. Will you pray for me?”
Glad Maël D’Argent prepared to ride to Wulfen Castle, Mary Sarah said, “I do pray for you, and just as you are in need of prayer, so am I. I hope you remember me when you go to the Lord.”
Nicola smiled. “I shall pray for both our futures—more, these children.”
The Abbess of Lillefarne nodded, then veered toward a novice in need of relief.
A while later, hearing Nicola soothe the little one with a song, she looked to where the Norman noblewoman sat with her back against the wall, in her arms a Saxon whose thumb was no longer sucked, freeing both hands to play in the lady’s hair.
Nicola was impulsive and, at times, improper, but Mary Sarah envied her that. She was the clay Gytha could have molded into what was demanded of her granddaughter who was to be a Saxon strong of mind, body, and spirit. Instead, one born of a fierce Godwine warrior had feared furthering her audience with the chevalier, and not only because of the rebel who had delivered the children to the abbey.
Had she another opportunity to give ear to Sir Maël…
I would and be done with him forever, she told herself. And hoped she was done with him regardless—that never again his shadow covered her.
Chapter Four
The inner door was where Cyr had told he found it the night he scaled the wall to ensure rebels hidden in the passage were not let into the abbey to claim sanctuary. Thus, the Saxons, including Vitalis, had been trapped inside.
With less bloodshed than expected, Dougray, Maël, and their men had brought out the rebels the way they had entered—through the outer door concealed by a garden near the abbey’s wall.
Now having moved aside empty barrels stacked in a shed erected against the inner wall, Maël lowered to his haunches before an iron door barred this side to allow the keeper of Lillefarne’s secret to control who entered here. That long ago eve, the keeper had been Aelfled, but who was it now? Abbess Mary Sarah? Her alone?
Of greater import, at this moment were rebels on the other side? With William’s men hunting them out of the North, it was very possible. But if rebels hunkered in that narrow passage, it was unlikely the one Maël sought was there. Still, one might know where Vitalis could be found.
Seeking the vibration of movement between inner and outer walls, Maël splayed a hand on the cool iron, slowed his breath, and listened. Naught. He leaned in, pressed an ear to the door, and closed his eyes. Still naught, though that did not mean none were in the passage. Unfortunately, he did not possess the unnaturally keen senses of Theriot who would have known if prey dwelt within and been fairly accurate in determining their number.
“Theriot,” Maël rasped and, opening his eyes, drew back. At Stern Castle he had been dealt a blow when, seeking assurance from his mother that the youngest of his male cousins had been found, he was met with surprised silence.
Tidings sent of Theriot’s disappearance had not reached Cyr nor Dougray before they departed for Normandy, nor Guarin at Wulfen, meaning Maël’s messenger had met a bad end in riding the same direction as Saxons fleeing William’s solution to the resistance.
Theriot lives, Maël assured himself, chest tightening over time that would be better spent searching for him than retrieving a piece of cloth to preserve the king’s dignity. At every place Maël and his men paused in following leads of what remained of the Rebels of the Pale, he had asked after sightings of a young Norman of dark silvered hair, but much more could have been done.
If not that Guarin would organize a search for his youngest brother as soon as he learned of his disappearance, Maël would keep his word to his liege later rather than now regardless of the opposition of men chosen to accompany the king’s captain of the guard, among them a Saxon nobleman all the more distasteful for his fanatical support of the conqueror over his own people.
The D’Argents remained loyal to the man who had longer been their duke than their king, but now mostly because of oaths given and the value William placed on their vassalage that permitted Maël’s family to stand more firm in their beliefs than most when things were demanded of them for which many a Norman would answer to God.
The creak of the shed’s door sounded, then sunlight sprang between the barrels, striping him, the iron door, and the stone wall.
The arrival of the woman who hated him did not surprise since he had not stealthily gained the shed, instead turning the heads of residents who might have once paused over his silvered hair but now over a terribly scarred face.
Hearing her footsteps over the dirt floor, he straightened and turned to where she would appear in the gap of displaced barrels.
A moment later, she halted so abruptly her skirts flared, permitting a glimpse of shapely ankles. Too, her head covering was askew, gifting him with one more piec
e of the woman he was fairly certain he had encountered in the year and a half before Cyr sent him to Lillefarne to collect Aelfled. Above wide eyes, dark hair peaked on a brow no longer beautifully smooth as when she had stood before him earlier.
He inclined his head. “Abbess.”
She stepped into the space one would not know was clear of barrels had Maël not moved two aside. “You trespass, Sir Maël!”
“Necessary since you refused me further audience.”
She glanced at the iron door. “Of what use verifying the existence of a passage that once offered sanctuary to my charges should they find themselves attacked inside the abbey the same as they have been outside it?”
Knowing she referred to the ravishment of two novices in the wood whilst a portion of Wulfenshire lands was held by the mercenary Dougray had recently defeated at Wulfen Castle, he said, “Unfortunate that, and duly avenged by those of the resistance who made use of the passage far more than your charges.”
Her chin rose higher. “I am aware of only one occasion rebels entered there without my permission, and as you and your cousins put finish to that, Norman knowledge of the passage renders it useless to the rebellion—indeed, any Saxon fleeing the thieves and murderers overrunning our country.”
It would be easy to take offense but wrong, especially since the harrying.
“And so I ask again the reason you trespass on holy ground, Sir Maël.”
“I seek Vitalis.”
He hoped blunt honesty would afford a glimpse of alarm, evidencing even if the rebel leader was not in the passage, others were. And she did not disappoint, fleeting though the fear in her eyes and soft the catch of her breath.
“How you reach, Sir Maël! I cannot believe such desperation worthy of a chevalier charged with protecting the man who perches on England’s throne.”
Again, easy to be offended, in this instance because the attack was personal, but he said evenly, “Not desperation, Abbess—diligence, tedious though it is. Hence, I must verify no one is on the other side.” He nodded at the door that would require he bend low to pass through it. “Now if enough time has passed to permit any who lurk inside to unbar the door to the garden where I have posted men, I would have you deliver me a torch.”
Now she was offended, but there was smugness about her smile. “I shall not be long,” she said.
Shortly, she returned and thrust a torch at him. He thought an ember leapt onto his hand when he took it, but the stinging heat was delivered by soft skin across which his calloused fingers traveled.
So quickly she snatched her hand away, it was possible she felt it too—and wished to feel it no more than he who knew what it was though he had not been moved to attraction since taking up residence in the cold place inside him following Hastings. Could she identify it as well? Or was her reaction that of a bride of Christ resigned to never knowing the touch of a man?
Giving him a dismissive look, she stepped to the barred door.
Saxon women! he silently denounced, then turned that frustration on himself. Years from now he might once more open himself to the allure of the fairer sex providing he had cause to pursue marriage, but not now. And never a Saxon as his—
Banishing that memory, he turned his thoughts to his cousins. Three had fallen prey to women of this country, sacrificing and suffering for infatuation. He would not. Still, he could not deny he was relieved the abbess was committed to the Lord.
The scrape of metal returned her to his regard, and he saw she had set back the bar.
He would have opened the door more cautiously than she, but were rebels there, they would not harm the one harboring them.
The abbess peered over her shoulder, causing her veil to shift further off center and reveal a slender neck sloping into an ivory shoulder. “Come see I speak true,” she said and ducked to clear a rusted iron lintel.
Stripes of sunlight and the torch’s glow entering the passage with her revealed a dirt floor and the lower wall opposite.
Certain a representative of God would not lead him to his death, Maël started to follow, but an inner voice warned, She is of the Church of England that was in such need of reform the pope gave William his blessing to wage war. And godly though she is meant to be, she does not hide her hatred of Normans.
He drew the D’Argent dagger, thrust the torch inside to confirm a single occupant, and straightened before the abbess.
She glanced at the blade. “As told, the passage is empty, Sir Maël.”
Certainly true of this section. And from the silence that fell between them and confirmed by his senses, likely true of the section around the corner just as he, Cyr, and Dougray had left it the night they cleared it of rebels.
“So it appears, but again, due diligence.”
She gestured for him to precede her. Were she a man, he would not allow her to keep company with his back, but though a woman, still he kept an ear turned to her lest she trouble him in the slightest.
The passage, strung with webs that would be more intricate were their spinners left in peace, narrowed halfway down its course. As he knew from when last he was here, further it narrowed around the corner.
When he turned it, a scuttle sounded and he tensed in anticipation of abandoning the torch to bring his sword to hand, but the light revealed the last coursing of the passage was clear except for rats bustling toward whichever gaps in the stones they could squeeze through.
The abbess expressed no dismay over vermin surely glimpsed beyond him. But then, neither did she seem afeared of being alone with one who, were he dishonorable, would prove more dangerous than rats. Because of his family’s reputation and her interactions with Nicola and others? Or might her confidence be credited to an encounter with him at a place other than Lillefarne which she neither acknowledged nor denied?
Ahead, the creatures went from sight, and shortly torchlight revealed greatly gapped stones at the farthest end of the passage. “For a wall recently constructed, there is much settling,” he said.
“To fend off Normans who think naught of attacking houses of God, the wall had to be raised quickly,” the abbess said. “Hence, in places it is not as solid as we wish.”
He halted before the door whose bar was in place, proving none had departed the passage since his discovery of the shed.
“All is as told, Sir Maël.”
“You spoke true, empty but for rats and other vermin. This day.”
“Every day,” she said, then, “As you know, the garden is beyond. And your men as well?”
Only if those awaiting him outside the walls were moved there by boredom or a need for privacy in which to relieve themselves. He had considered setting men to keep watch over the garden but determined in the unlikely event rebels were here during the day, it was better he deal with them than reveal the abbey’s vulnerability to those who had yet to earn his trust. Too, he would have none come between him and any who could yield word of Theriot.
“My men as well,” he said as he peered past the frame made of her veil into a uniquely pretty face with large eyes, snub nose, wide mouth, and slightly cleft chin. Guessing she was aged five to eight years beyond twenty, he returned his gaze to hers.
“It appears we are done here,” she said.
He slid his dagger in its scabbard. This time as he traversed the passage at her back, he looked closer on the stone walls.
Blood having been cast against them, in several places he glimpsed crimson gone brown that had escaped scouring. Though no mortal wounds had been dealt here, that nearly changed when the rebels assembled in the garden to be bound and marched to Stern.
Harsh words had been spoken between Dougray and Vitalis that became fists which could have killed had not the two been dragged apart. And yet, less than six months past, something of a truce was declared between them—all because of the rebel, Em, who had also bewitched a D’Argent.
Upon reaching the inner wall’s door, the abbess turned. “Curiosity bids me ask—why do you search for
Vitalis?”
He settled into his heels. “Curiosity bids me ask—why so curious? Are you acquainted with the leader of the Rebels of the Pale?”
A corner of her mouth jerked. “I know little of him other than he was Lady Hawisa’s housecarle before the great battle, took charge of her rebels when your king wed her to your cousin, and made warriors of the men and women bent on resisting Norman rule. As for my curiosity, I understand his rebels disbanded following the Battle of Stafford. Hence, as he is no longer a threat to William, for what do you hunt him? Vengeance, though the Lord claims it as His own? Or does your liege yet fear Vitalis—one man alone?”
The Rebels of the Pale had mostly disbanded. Though scores had returned to their homes and accepted William’s rule, a dozen willing to give their lives even in the absence of hope had remained with Vitalis. And Maël would not be surprised if she knew that.
“It is not for me to question the king’s motives, Abbess. I but follow orders.”
Her eyes glittered. “Were you not a D’Argent, more I would believe you ignorant of William’s motives. Blessedly, they are of no consequence to those of Lillefarne. As told, curiosity bid me ask. Now allow me to see you to your destrier so you may resume your journey.”
Not curiosity alone, but it was past time he start for Wulfen.
She bent low to exit the passage, and as she stepped into the shed, gasped as if someone was present who should not be.
Once again, his hand was on his dagger, but as he drew it, he saw the cause of her distress was a matter of modesty.
On the other side of the door, she reached to the head covering snagged on the rusted lintel. He caught hold of it first, the drab linen between his fingers soft from much wear and many washings. Unlike some of the Church, the Abbess of Lillefarne did not indulge in fine trappings whose coin was intended for those with far less than she.