The Girl in the Ice (A Stephen Attebrook mystery Book 4)

by Jason Vail

  Stephen then remembered what Harry had told him. “Your barn was burned.”

  “It was more than my barn — my house and all its outbuildings were laid waste, not to mention my village. Nothing remains there but cinders.”

  “I am so sorry,” Stephen murmured, who understood what it was like to lose everything you have better than most people.

  “Save your sympathy,” Gardeuille snorted, drinking long from his wine cup. “We know what side you’re on.”

  “Sir!” Margaret spoke up. “Let us not quarrel. We are friends here.”

  “What friend could he be?” Gardeuille said. “He is a king’s man.”

  “Yet I think you will find true sympathy there,” she said. “Stephen, as you may suspect from Arnold’s misfortune that similar things have happened to people in Shropshire — house burnings, barns destroyed, villages laid waste, the harvest carried off.”

  “A common problem in the March,” Stephen said.

  “Common enough,” she replied, “but seldom does it happen to folk living east of the Shrewsbury-Ludlow road.” She waved at the other men. “All have lands east of the road. Since the outbreak of the war with the Welsh, all have been ravaged.”

  “So?”

  “So, all are supporters of the barons. You may recall having seen their names on Baynard’s list.”

  Now that Stephen thought about, he remembered at least two, Bromptone and Farlegh. “What of it?”

  “We do not think it is a coincidence. I have made inquiries. No one else has suffered so, none who has favored the king.”

  “And you suspect whom?”

  “One could throw many names on the table,” she said. “But we have no proof against anyone.”

  “King’s men, of course,” Stephen said.

  “Damned right, it’s king’s men,” Farlegh snapped.

  “But you’re certain it’s not the Welsh,” Stephen said.

  “I was home,” Farlegh said. “I defended my house and they could not burn that. But they burned my barn and village. They weren’t Welshmen. They were English. I could hear them talking plain as I hear you.”

  “That’s what my people say,” Bromptone said. “Englishmen, not Welsh.”

  Stephen swirled the tip of his finger in a puddle of wine spilled on the tabletop that had not soaked completely through the cloth covering. “There are quite a few king’s men hereabout. It could have been practically anybody.”

  “It would have had to be a man capable of raising a good-sized force,” Margaret said. “There were twenty to thirty men involved in each raid. Not an army, perhaps, but large enough for its purpose.”

  “Archers or men at arms?” Stephen asked.

  “Archers, mainly,” Farlegh said, “from what I saw. A couple of men at arms or three. But mostly archers.”

  “It’s not hard to raise thirty archers in the March on the promise of plunder,” Stephen said. “It could indeed have been anyone. Your close neighbors, in fact.”

  “This is not simple raiding,” Juste spoke out for the first time. “They picked us out deliberately! They meant to ruin us! Because we have spoken out against the king!”

  “The raiders passed by other manors fat with the harvest to get to us,” Bromptone added.

  “Guesses,” Stephen said, who knew quite well the danger of making them, for he was prone to charge forward on them and that had led to mistakes. “What proof do you have?”

  “Very little, I’m afraid,” Bromptone said. “We, or I should say, our hostess has suggested you would find it, as we are not as skilled as one would hope for such an endeavor, I am afraid. It is great fortune that we should all find ourselves in Shrewsbury at once, but good will come of it, I hope.”

  “What do you want from me?” Stephen asked. “To name your attacker — even if it leads to a king’s man?”

  “I told you he could not be relied upon!” Gardeuille slapped the table.

  “I think that Stephen cares more about truth and the law than he has let on to you,” Margaret said. “And we have law on our side.”

  “Fat lot of good the law does in war,” Farlegh said. “And that’s where we are now, at war.”

  “It is true that law and war have nothing to do with each other,” Margaret said. “But war has not yet broken out. We are dealing with simple pillage and murder. And murder is Stephen’s trade, not the doing of it, but the solving of it. Am I right?”

  “This is not my jurisdiction,” Stephen said. “You should go to the sheriff.”

  “He is a king’s man!” Gardeuille said. “He will look the other way out of sympathy for our assailants, if he’s not already been paid to do so.”

  Margaret folded her hands on the table, playing with an opal ring on an index finger. “Stephen, we must know who was behind these attacks. There are sure to be others. Please help us. If we have a name, at least there is a chance we can put a stop to the terror before more harm comes to other innocent people.”

  She made her plea so sweetly that Stephen thought she had some hidden motive. If he agreed, he could step deeply into the conflict that was coming between King Henry and Montfort. Although war offered opportunities for men of his position, his maimed foot rendered him incapable of taking advantage of them. No one wanted a warrior who couldn’t properly fight from a horse. Better judgment said he should decline. He had other business that need tending. He couldn’t just go off on this errand.

  Then Farlegh said to no one in particular, rubbing his face, “I shall not soon forget the sight of all those arrows sticking out of my people, as if they were pincushions. They even shot down the dogs.”

  “Arrows?” Stephen asked.

  “Oh, yes, they left quite a lot of them behind,” Farlegh said.

  “What did you do with them?”

  “We pulled them out of the dead and burned them,” Juste said. “What else were we to do with them?”

  “What did they look like, these arrows?” Stephen asked.

  “What has that got to do with anything?” Gardeuille asked.

  Stephen asked, “Were any painted?”

  “Now that I think on it,” Farlegh said, “they were yellow, most of them.”

  “Is that all?” Stephen asked.

  “No,” Farlegh replied. “They were red as well.”

  “Striped?” Stephen asked.

  “Indeed, I believe they were. By the nock.”

  Stephen looked at the others. “The same for you as well?”

  About the table, brows furrowed as memories were consulted. Bromptone and Gardeuille nodded. “I think so,” Bromptone said, “although I must admit, this was one detail I paid little attention to. Most were cleared away by the time I returned home”

  “Is this important?” Margaret said.

  “It is all you have to go on,” Stephen said. “No one bothered to track them, I suppose, to see where they had gone.”

  Heads wagged around the table.

  Yellow arrows with red stripes, Stephen thought. It could be coincidence. But he thought not.

  “If you find us the proof that will name a culprit,” Margaret said, “we can take the matter to law, and obtain some recompense, little as it is compared to what was lost.”

  Stephen knew he should refuse. If he was connected with their inquiry, as was sure to happen, what then? He had never seen Sir Geoffrey Randall enraged, but this would set him off and Stephen’s livelihood, meager as it was, would be lost. But then the memory of the dead Saltehuses, naked and surrounded by flies, especially the slack face of the little child, floated into his mind. Yellow arrows with red stripes: really, did it mean anything, anything at all?

  Against his better judgment, his mouth said the words, “I will accept your commission. Here are my terms.”

  The others had gone, and Stephen was alone with her by the fire in the center of the hall. The moment brought back the longing he had felt while he stood outside on the street, but she was unobtainable: interested in him only fo
r what she could use to her benefit. He smiled wryly, wishing it were not so. But the world did not conform to your expectations or desires.

  She was quiet, gazing into the fire, its orange light playing on her lovely face. He wondered what thoughts, what plans were churning within.

  “You think you know,” Stephen said.

  “What?” she asked.

  “You think you know who it is.”

  She shook her head, frowning into the flames. The expression hardened her face with a steely purpose that he was sure few ever got to witness. “There are several possibilities — Earl Bertram Montgomery, your friend Perceival FitzAllan, even,” she added lightly, “your cousin.”

  “You’d have me betray my cousin?” One of Stephen’s cousins was also a Marcher earl, though a lesser one than the other men she had named. The March had more earls than anywhere else in England, many of them men who elsewhere would be counted as mere barons.

  She smiled. “Well, I don’t really think he’s the one. His lands lie too far to the south. But you asked for names. Do you have anyone in mind?”

  He realized she had mentioned his cousin only to needle him. “I know a place where I might make fruitful inquiries. There are a few things I will need, besides what we’ve already agreed on.”

  “Oh? And what are those?”

  “A horse with full tack, a new set of clothes that would look well on an archer, a longbow, and arrows.”

  “At my expense?”

  “Naturally. This is your project.”

  “And you will keep the horse? They are expensive.”

  “You can have it back when I’m done.”

  Margaret placed her hand upon his. “Stephen, what are you up to?”

  Stephen withdrew his hand and stood up. “It’s better if no one knows.”

  “You don’t trust me?”

  “Oh, I’ve already seen how far I can trust you. It’s the others I’m worried about. Good night.”

  Chapter 15

  The curfew bell had rung more than an hour before, and the streets were quiet under a night of scattered cloud, sharp stars, and a half moon, which made almost unnecessary the lantern carried by the boy who’d fetched him to Margaret’s house and now was to escort him back.

  Stephen turned toward Doggepol Street, but the boy said, “Sir, the drawbridge will be up. They let it down for no one at night. We’ll have to go by the east quay. We shall hire a boat there to take you back.”

  “After you, then,” Stephen said, pulling up the hood of his cloak against the cold. Although it had been a warm day, the night had brought with it a teeth-chattering chill that crept over the town while he had warmed by Margaret’s fire. Already, the mud was beginning to freeze, turning the rutted street into a corrugated surface that made walking difficult, puddles rimed with ice between the ridges.

  “This way, sir,” the boy said, stumbling the other way toward the corner of Saint Mary’s, holding the lantern high upon its pole to light their way.

  Stephen followed as best he could, hopping from one ridge to another. The ridges were not always fully frozen yet, so sometimes he slipped into a puddle with a splash and a repressed curse. He thought he heard similar splashes in the distance as if another curfew-breaker was making his way along Doggepol by the front of the church, but when he looked behind he saw nothing but empty street and dark houses, bathed in pale moonlight.

  As Stephen and the boy reached the northern side of the church, a figure came round the far corner and stopped before them in the middle of the street. There was light enough to make out that he held a cudgel in one hand. An instinct for ambushes told Stephen that he couldn’t be the only one: he was meant to hold his victim’s attention while the real threat approached from another direction. He looked quickly backward, and, sure enough, there were two more men emerging from the shadows, also armed with cudgels.

  “Sir?” the boy called as he pulled up short at the sight of the man ahead, smart enough to know trouble when it reared its head. He bravely pulled his knife, but Stephen said, “Put that up and get out of the way. This isn’t your quarrel.”

  From the light thrown down by the lantern, Stephen recognized the man ahead as the fellow called Mike from earlier in the day outside Tomkys’ shop.

  “Hello, Mike,” Stephen called. “It’s a bit cold for a stroll in the dark. But then, I suppose you’re looking for me.”

  “That we are,” Mike said, slapping his palm with the cudgel.

  “Is there a price on my head? I hope FitzAllan’s made it a good one.”

  “He’s made it rich enough.”

  “Better have, because you’re going to have to earn it.”

  “That’s big talk,” Mike said as the three FitzAllan men closed in.

  “No talk’s too big for the man who broke out of that pig sty you called a gaol,” Stephen said. “While it was on fire, no less. A fat bastard like you couldn’t do it. You’d have roasted like the rat you are. What did you do when the Welsh came to Clun? Hide in the cellar?”

  Mike spat and came toward him.

  Stephen stepped in Mike’s direction as if about to attack, then spun about and ran at one of those behind, the man on his left. The object of Stephen’s attention raised his cudgel and, as he struck a mighty blow with all his strength, Stephen slipped to the left so that the stick flew just past his head. Stephen kicked the fellow in the stomach, and seized his cudgel as he bent over. Stephen stepped around the fallen man, keeping the casualty between him and Mike, as he launched a savage horizontal blow at the third assailant followed immediately by another from the other side. The man drew back, avoiding the blows, stumbling in a rut. Stephen grasped the stick with a hand in the middle and rammed one end into the fellow’s throat, and he fell over backwards making an awful throttling sound.

  Now Stephen turned to face Mike, who had pulled up.

  They stood in their guards, ready for each other in the moonlight, the jets from their labored breathing filling the air about them like smoke.

  “Call for the watch, why don’t you?” Stephen asked.

  “I ought to,” Mike said. “You’ve done murder.”

  “And I’m about to do another.”

  But if Mike thought Stephen intended him to be the target, he was mistaken. Stephen swung the cudgel down on the head of the first fellow he had knocked down, who was just then struggling to his knees. That fellow collapsed face down in a puddle and did not move.

  “There,” Stephen said. “Now it’s your turn.”

  Mike held his cudgel over his right shoulder as if he was ready to fight. Then he turned and ran.

  On flat ground and in daylight he would have got away, but it was dark and the street was full of ruts. Mike stumbled on one, which slowed him enough that, even with a bad foot, Stephen caught up with him by the church’s far corner. He extended the cudgel between Mike’s pumping legs. Mike fell heavily on the half frozen ground. He rolled on his back and thrust upward with his cudgel. Stephen batted it out of the way, put a foot on his arm and planted a knee on Mike’s chest. He drew his dagger and set the point under Mike’s chin.

  Mike grimaced and closed his eyes.

  “We’re not done yet,” Stephen said. “I’ve some questions I want answered first. If you answer me true, I’ll let you live.”

  Mike’s eyes fluttered, then opened so wide that the whites were visible all around. He looked at the dagger, eyes almost crossing. The swagger had gone out of him. Pinned to the ground with the dagger at his throat, having seen how far Stephen would go, he had no doubt Stephen was not bluffing. “Get off my chest,” he gasped.

  “No,” Stephen said, although he removed some of the pressure.

  “What do you want?”

  “There’ve been some village burnings, barn burnings east of the Ludlow road. It’s FitzAllan’s doing, isn’t it?”

  “I don’t know nothing about no burnings! Other than what the Welsh have done!”

  “Neither you nor your friend
s have been out in the night for Lord Percy, with torches?”

  “No! I swear!”

  Stephen hesitated. He had been so certain. It had to be FitzAllan. Mike must be lying. Uncertainly, he looked up. The boy with the lantern had not run away. Drawn to the tableaux in the street, he had stumbled over and was gawking at the two men. Stephen spotted a small silver cross slip out of the boys shirt.

  “Give me that!” he barked to the boy.

  “What?”

  “Your cross! I won’t keep it. I just want to borrow it.”

  The boy drew the chain over his head and handed the cross to Stephen.

  He held it to Mike’s lips. “Kiss it,” Stephen said, “and swear to God what you say is true.”

  Lips trembling, Mike kissed the cross in Stephen’s fingers. “I swear,” he stammered.

  “Did FitzAllan or any of his men have anything to do with the burnings?”

  “We didn’t have nothing to do with no burnings.”

  “You’d know if anyone on Clun manor was involved.”

  “I’d know. I’m the second in command of the lord’s archers.”

  “Shit,” Stephen said.

  “Are you done? Will you get off my chest now and let me up?”

  Stephen held out the cross again. “There’re been robberies on the Ludlow road, murders. In November six people and a child carrying a load of salt north of Onibury.”

  “I don’t know nothing about that.”

  “You swear on the cross?”

  “I-I-I swear, for God’s sake!”

  “No one in Clun?”

  “No one’s said a thing about robberies or murders, and I ain’t had anything to do with any!”

  “And no one you know.”

  “No one I know,” Mike wheezed.

  “Are you going to let him go?” the boy asked.

  Stephen hesitated. He shouldn’t. It was not the prudent thing to do. If he released Mike, he’d return to Clun, tell FitzAllan what had happened, and the next thing FitzAllan would appeal against him for murder. But the heat that had consumed Stephen had cooled. And he had given his promise; while not exactly an oath it was close enough. Against his better judgment, he stood up and backed away.