“Thread!” He snorted and she heard the cup scrape the tabletop. “Such an important duty fits you ill, not-Isobel.”
Helena kept her back to him. She threw the chest open and searched among lengths of cloth, skeins of wool and implements. “It is simply a task.”
“You won’t tell me the truth, either, will you? Not even your name.” An odd inflexion in his tone made her turn to see what showed in his face. But his face was a tight, cynical mask.
Helena turned back to the chest, more to hide her face than to continue her search for thread, for there was patently none there. “I withhold my name for a purpose, my lord.”
“Purpose.” He repeated the word with a sigh. “I envy you your purpose, not-Isobel, though I know it not. To have purpose at all is a great privilege.”
“Is it?” Helena turned to face him, surprised. “Your life is so empty of purpose you must envy those who have it?”
Stephen laughed. It began as a deep, low chuckle and quickly escalated to a full-bellied roar. His entire body shook as he threw his head back to give voice to the sound. But the tendons in his neck were strained and his hands curled into tight fists. There was no mirth in the laughter at all. It sounded deeply bitter.
Astonished and a little frightened, Helena wondered what caused such a demonic expression.
Stephen ceased, finally, and looked at her. His eyes glinted with either anger or merriment, or perhaps both. “You may well look at me askance, not-Isobel. I am indeed a man empty of purpose. I have been decreed so by Richard himself. He does not even want my coin.” As he spoke the last word, he swept the cup off the table with a sharp blow of his hand.
Helena flinched violently and smothered a small scream.
The cup clattered wetly against the wall.
Stephen threw himself to his feet and stalked to the tiny slit of a window.
Helena wanted to flee but was held in place because she recognized Dinan’s agony. He gripped the window, breathing deeply. It was as if he were straining to leap out into the air. Escape, her mind whispered. He looks for escape.
“I have seen sights and heard tales even a troubadour could not imagine,” he said quietly. “I am acknowledged the greatest fighter, besides Richard himself. I have spent my life—my life—serving the king. I never considered it might change.”
“You wronged him,” Helena whispered.
“I spoke nothing but the truth!” He turned to face her. “Do they tell you that, those who fill your heart with fear of me, not-Isobel?”
“No.”
“No, they would not, for Richard will not speak of how I wronged him.”
“That is true. I do not know what your crime was, yet others who crossed Richard had their crimes retold in the smallest cot.”
“Truth has ill-served me. Perhaps you are wiser to avoid speaking the truth.”
“Is that why you do not betray me?” The question was out before Helena thought to censor it. So much for not baiting the bear. Mentally, she shrugged. It was out now.
Stephen did not seem to find the question a rousing one. He stared out the window again. “Have you ever walked the beaches of Brittany, Isobel?”
“I? Yes, some time ago, when I was a child.”
“The sand there on the edge of the water, where the rocks cease. Do you remember it?”
She nodded. “Gray and dirty. It sucks at your feet and clings like mud.”
“And when it dries?”
“It falls apart into powder. Tiny grains that fly away.”
“Imagine those grains as white grains, Isobel. Clean, white, endless grains. Can you do that?”
“Yes, I can do that.”
“Imagine many thousands of them. A whole hill of them.”
“I have seen hills like that, hills of sand.”
“Have you seen hills of sand higher than a cathedral spire?”
“No.” The very idea was astonishing.
“Then you cannot imagine thousands of such hills, one after another, after another, spread from horizon to horizon.”
Helena shook her head.
“If you were to stand on the top of such a hill, it would not matter in which direction you turned. All you would see, for as far as you could see, are more hills of sand. If you were to walk across all those hills to the farthest you could see, you would find more hills ahead.”
“It is impossible,” Helena whispered. “There is not that much empty land to be had.”
“I have seen it. I have walked across it. It took five days. I carried my own water and food, for nothing lives there. It is dry, drier than anything you can imagine. And hot. You want to shed all your clothing but you cannot, for the sun would soon burn you to the core. The natives there wrap themselves in cloth until only their eyes show.”
“You have seen…” The idea took Helena’s breath away. Stephen was a normal baron who had traveled to the Holy Lands. He did not bear the mark of such strange travels.
“When you have walked five nights and slept during the hot days, you finally reach the end of the hills.”
“And?” Helena prompted.
“And you reach a land more desolate and blasted than God could possibly have intended. You say you could not imagine the hills, not-Isobel. I could not have imagined this place, even after seeing the hills. It is flat, with rocks scattered across it. Sometimes there are cliffs, made of the sharpest layers of stone. Nothing moves except the wind. Even the hills of sand are more alive for they move over time, pushed by the wind. But not this place. It has been there since man began and will be there long after man departs.” He looked out the window again, remembering.
“You walked across that too?”
“Yes, and the journey came closer to killing me than ever a Saracen did in all my time in the Holy Lands.”
“It sounds godless. Horrible.”
“It is a magnificent place.”
“It could not be!”
“It is.” He sighed. “Each day there is hotter than the hottest day you have ever experienced. Each night is colder than a night spent on the Pennines. Death walks by your side when you walk there. But Death is not a vicious creature there. Death simply is.”
“You find it magnificent because death stalked you there?”
“Because death is so impersonal. Before I found myself there I was the favored companion of Richard. I had lands and titles and the blessing of the church. I had received rewards for my victories in battle. I had the command of knights who threw themselves into battle and death at my word. I had fought Saracens and lived. I counted myself a man of the world.” He moved back to the fragile stool and sat down, clasping his hands. The clasped hands spoke of passion, a need to make her understand perhaps. “When I came to that place, I was nothing. It did not matter that I had commanded a fighting force powerful enough to preserve a country. Authority could not hold back death if death chose to take me. It did not matter that I had titles and land. They would not provide me with food and water to survive. Fearing death, railing at it, calling it unjustified would not stop it either. Nothing I was could possibly stop the tide of natural events there. They had been cycling through their patterns for all time. I was not even of passing interest. I was less than an ant.”
Helena frowned. He spoke of death and desolation almost fondly. “You admire it.”
“I am in awe of it. Time marches on and that place endures. It is mightier than anything we petty humans consider important…and the things we consider important—how puny they are!”
She thought she understood. “That is why you do not betray my secret? Because it is puny?”
“I do not betray your secret, not-Isobel, because your secret purpose is of value to you. Why should I take it from you? Enjoy it.”
“You came back from that place and your life was so empty?”
“I came back and found life was precious, but men complicate their affairs. They lose sight of the basic truth. Truth, not-Isobel, is all we have to disting
uish our lives. I learned to see the fundamental truth of life out there and now I pay the price for that learning.”
“You spoke of what lay in your heart,” Helena guessed.
“Foolishly, as I have learned.” He sighed. “Truth has a price I did not expect.”
Her mind whirled with unpalatable thoughts. The agony he carried she did, indeed, recognize. He had survived events that had utterly changed the way he thought, the way he judged his world and the people in it—just as she had. She carried a secret identity and purpose, which she feared to speak aloud. In that, they differed. He had faced a far greater challenge than she and afterward dared to speak the truth as he saw it. He did not hide the changes that had been wrought in him.
“You have more courage than I.” Her voice was bodiless after his ringing tones but her words were undiluted truth. Even afterward, she could not tell what prompted her to do so but Helena sank to her knees in front of Stephen and laid her hand on his. “You are far greater in spirit than I will ever be.” She bowed her head. “My name is Helena, my lord.”
She lifted her head and found he stared at her with open wonder. His lips were parted as if he were about to speak but had lost the words. His hand moved under hers. Helena’s fingers were caught in his. Stephen slid from the stool to kneel in front of her, holding her hand aloft as one might for a dance. He was far bigger than she and Helena had to lift her chin again to look at him.
“Your gift humbles me, Helena.” Then he smiled and was transformed. The impression of an angry bear fled. There was devilish merriment in him but it was not directed toward her. Helena knew with complete certainty she had just been included inside an invisible circle that surrounded him. It was the shield he kept against the rest of the world. She knew too, that no one else had been allowed in but her.
Stephen touched the center of his chest with his free hand. “Your secret is safe with me.” Helena knew she could rely utterly on his discretion.
They stayed there for a moment, on their knees, facing each other in that forgotten, dusty room, two people momentarily as outside human affairs as the room itself.
Then Stephen stood and helped Helena to her feet. “You should return, or they will begin to wonder where you are.” With that statement he became a contributor to her small conspiracy.
An ally.
It was only as Helena returned to Catherine’s chamber that she recalled Catherine’s warning and realized she had as her ally one of the most politically dangerous men in Europe.
Chapter Six
The talk at supper that evening was of nothing but Richard’s call for men or money. Even though Helena did not attend the evening meal, she still heard of it from Maud, who brought a meal for both her and Catherine early in the evening.
Richard had called for more men? As she ate, Helena wondered if Stephen of Dinan was among those called. Then she remembered the state in which she had found him. He does not want even my coin, he’d said.
Apparently, Stephen had been excluded from Richard’s call, which was ironic, for if Maud’s assessment of the mood in the dining hall was accurate, Stephen was the only man willing to meet that call. It was little wonder he’d searched for solace in a flagon of wine. For a man like him, a Crusader and a man of action, Richard’s rejection must have been a bitter blow.
Helena retired early. There was little point in maintaining Catherine’s illusion any longer, for Hubert would return to his wife’s side soon enough.
Sleep was again a poor companion. Helena found refuge in reaffirming her private pledge. She would put aside this wasted day and start again on the morrow.
Catherine rose from her bed the next day vowing she felt no pain. With Catherine willing to be alone and complete the tunics Helena had not finished, Helena would be able to slip from the town.
Accordingly, shortly after Maud had seen to the needs of those breaking their fast, she and Helena crept out of Oxford loaded with bundles of food. They were destined for Maud’s own village, a place on the river a mile or so away.
Helena left Oxford with a light heart. The possibility of being discovered had sharply receded. She no longer feared what Dinan planned to do with her. Instead she felt secure, knowing he had become her partner in silence.
At the village, Maud guided Helena to the homes of those most in need and helped distribute the food. As always when she was among peasants and serfs, Helena fought a growing anger and frustration. These were her people! Their hunger and hardships hardened her determination to see her own plans through.
They had just reached the fifth such home when the clatter of horses’ hooves sounded from the road that led to Oxford. Horses meant barons or knights. Concern flooded Helena. She could not afford to be seen here. It would prompt suspicions and questions she could not answer. She glanced behind her. No sign of them yet but they were near and drawing closer.
“The horsemen, my lady?” Maud asked breathlessly. Helena realized the stout woman was hurrying to keep up with her as she stepped quickly across the muddy ruts of the small, irregular square of the village.
“Yes, the horsemen. I can’t be seen here.”
“Because of the food?”
“Yes, the food.” The food was part of the problem after all. “Is there somewhere I can hide ’til they have passed?”
Maud gathered her ample skirts and the long, smeared apron she wore even outside the kitchen and hurried her pace. “This way!”
She headed for the most dilapidated cot in sight, a building that leaned and looked likely to collapse into a tired heap of daub and rubble if someone were to push too heavily against it.
Maud ducked under the tilted doorway, pushing aside the skins that covered it. Helena followed her and stepped into startling dimness. There was a muttered conversation in the corner. As her sight adjusted to the low light, Helena saw Maud bent over the ear of a woman sitting with a babe to her breast. There was another child at her knee, wailing piteously. The urge to comfort him was strong but the peril outside was greater.
Helena whirled back to the doorway and watched through a chink in the skins.
Six or eight men rode into the square and slowed. They gathered into a solid group, horses prancing together and their tossing heads.
“The horses are fresh. They haven’t ridden far,” Helena whispered.
Maud came to her side. The small child on her hip hiccupped with the last of his tears, his thumb in his mouth. She peered out. “Lord help us, it’s the sheriff!”
The woman in the corner moaned, eyes rolling.
“The sheriff? Why?”
“Why else? For taxes! ’E’s been up and down the shire these three days past.”
“While the council meets? Is there a connection?”
“Aye. ’E seeks to impress ’is lordship, the Archbishop.”
“Hubert Walter?”
“That be the one. The King’s Chief Justiciar.”
“He seeks to impress Lord Hubert with money?”
“There were rumors the king looked for money, and whatever yon Sheriff collects, ’e gets to keep a part of, mind.”
“Yes, I understand.” Helena sighed. This system had been the undoing of too many of her people.
The men had climbed from their horses and stood in a tight group. They appeared to sense they were not welcomed here. In the moment they had appeared in the square, everyone outside had melted away like ghosts.
One man stepped from the group, squared his shoulders and took a deep breath. “Hear ye, all of the village of Ripponwold! Stand forth and prepare to reckon your taxes!”
It seemed a shiver went through the village. Helena knew it was her imagination but even the group in the center of the muddy square muttered uneasily.
“Step forward at once!” the crier demanded.
His only answer was the slow lift and snap of some freshly laundered rags hanging over a boxwood bush, stirring in the fitful breeze.
That same breeze brought to Helena’s straini
ng ear the words muttered by one of the men, “Turn them out! By God, I’ll have the food from their tables if that’s what it takes!” The speaker, a fat little man with no hair, turned his back on the village. “Not an honest worker among the lot of them!” he flung over his shoulder. He fumbled at his belt for the silver flask that hung there.
This must be the sheriff, she realized, for at his words most of the men around him scattered to the four corners of the square. Swords drawn, they dived unannounced into the cottages, a pair to each.
For the moment their own shelter was overlooked but it would not be so for long. Already, sharp cries of fear and indignation came from the other buildings. The pillaging would be thorough and none would be spared if the Sheriff had his way.
Helena whirled from the door, looking for a way out. Her gaze fell on the nursing woman. “They will be here soon,” she said.
“I have nothing more for them to take.”
“My lady, you cannot stay!” Maud whispered and plucked at Helena’s sleeve. The tug on the long, embroidered, sleeve hem reminded Helena of her appearance. She wore the full raiment of a court lady—wimple, veil and cloak. Her gown was full length with the hint of a train as was expected even during the day, since England had reached such prominence in European affairs. It was usually better she be seen this way, to more firmly fix in others’ minds her identity as Isobel of Brittany, Norman lady.
But it would hamper her now and mark her in the Sheriff’s memory if she was discovered in this unlikely place. If she did not find a way out of the cot, she would indeed be found.
Moving rapidly, Helena stripped the veil and wimple from her head and offered them to Maud. “Do you have a pocket?”
“But they’re yours, my lady!” Maud shrank from touching the fine cloth.
Helena spread the long skirt of her dress. In the latest fashion, it clung to breast and hip and fell straight to the ground, to gather in folds around her feet. Beneath she wore a kirtle but no pocket, for it would disturb the line of the dress. “I cannot carry it. You can claim it as cloth for your work. Here.” Helena stuffed it into Maud’s ample apron pocket. “You may return it to me when we meet back in Oxford. Yes?”
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