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

by Jason Vail

  Now that he had light, Stephen saw that the barn was filled practically to bursting. The closest items were a half dozen carts and wagons jammed in together, the tackle for harnessing the horses thrown on their beds. To the left, great stacks of hay strained against railings to leave only a small passage down the middle. To right were barrels and sacks, each on one side. The sacks were marked with charcoal symbols to denote their contents: grain, mostly, but also peas and beans, and flour. The barrels also were marked and held wine (not many of those and right beside the door where it could quickly fetched so as not to try the lord’s patience when the supply in the hall ran out), salted pork, fish most likely dried or salted, almonds, apples, and pears. Farther to the right were the small barrels of spices — pepper, cinnamon, a mislaid sack of raisins, dates, figs, sage, parsley, garlic, and fennel were among the marks he recognized.

  But search as he might, Stephen did not find a single barrel of salt, nor any barrel marked by a dandelion. He had been sure he would find at least one — no, he had expected to find stacks of them jealously hoarded, for salt was an expensive and highly valued commodity, and not all of it would have been sold, but saved for use here or for sale in the future. He was bitterly disappointed.

  He stooped at the door to collect the straw he had used to light the candle, which he blew out, and stepped into the rain.

  It had taken a long time to search the barn, and he reckoned that the watch would be nearly over now. The night watches never lasted more than two hours. He could not be late to awaken the next watch; that would be received as a sign that everyone had fallen asleep, and there would be trouble then.

  But there was one more place he could look, two if you counted the pantry in the hall.

  He crossed the yard to the kitchen, a round building beside the hall, and the only one with stone walls, although like every other in the castle it had a roof of slatted wood. It was sure to have a small storeroom where the cooks put the things for which they had immediate use to spare folk from having to fetch items in bad weather.

  The kitchen door was no more secure than the barn in that it was not padlocked, although it was latched from the inside. That should have been a warning, but Stephen was too eager to get inside to heed it, and he slid his dagger through the gap to flip up the latch. But he had only to crack the door to realize the danger, for he heard the rustling of a straw mattress and then the sound of someone pissing in a night jar. He couldn’t properly bumble around the place with people sleeping inside; he would surely wake them. He eased the door closed, but not before someone said irritably, “Bloody hell. How’d that door get open!”

  Stephen flattened against the wall, hoping that the inhabitant of the kitchen would not think to investigate the cause for the disobedient door. Fortunately, he did not, since Stephen would have no good explanation for why he was not on the wall, and merely re-latched it.

  Stephen sighed with relief, and returned to the gate tower.

  Chapter 22

  Stephen awoke in a surly mood from lack of good sleep and last night’s failure, but he put aside those feelings and, fetching a pair of singlesticks from the rack in the hall, went looking for Edmund, since there was at least an hour before breakfast.

  It took some time to find the boy, for he was nowhere about in the bailey, and finally a woman doing laundry in a bucket by the well told him she’d seem him going up the stairs to the tower on the motte.

  Stephen found him on the ground floor, where the emergency stores and great bundles of arrows were kept. He noted with interest that these arrows were the same as the one he had found at the scene of the Saltehus’ murders, not that this fact alone proved anything.

  The boy was swinging a singlestick at a furry object dangling from an iron ring nailed to a post, and it took Stephen a moment in the dimness to realize that the object was a cat.

  “What are you doing?” Stephen asked, shocked. He pushed the boy away from the dangling cat and cut it down.

  “I’m practicing,” Edmund said.

  “You’ll learn nothing by this,” Stephen said. The cat was still alive, moving feebly, but it was clear it was too badly injured to survive. He killed it with his dagger. “Don’t ever do this again, or I’ll string you up and give you the same treatment.”

  “You can’t tell me what to do,” Edmund spat.

  “I can and I will. I am here to teach you to use a sword properly, and while you’re under my instruction you’ll do what I say.”

  “My father will see about that.”

  “Will your father be pleased to know what you do with cats?”

  “He won’t care.” But Edmund’s tone suggested some doubt about this.

  “We’ll speak to him about this when we’re done.” Stephen pushed open the doors so they had better light, and turned to Edmund. “Be on your guard.”

  Stephen resisted the urge to give Edmund a beating, which fight-masters often did to their pupils, as nothing encourages learning how to fence better than good cracks to the head and body. Instead, he confined his blows to touches, but Edmund flinched even at these caresses as if he had been struck hard. The boy’s parries and counters were slow and clumsy, and it was immediately apparent that he had no aptitude for swordplay, nor it seemed any great interest, for he was gasping for breath and demanded a halt after a mere quarter hour. Stephen had known many boys like him, or rather the men they became: rich fellows who wore their armor well but who had hardly any notion which end of a sword to grasp, and who did their best to avoid fighting, the sort who rode into battle only when there was no way they could avoid it, who usually hung back and let others do the real work while putting up a show so that everyone would think they were brave and skillful. Stephen did not let him have his break, but kept him going until the bell sounded for breakfast. Edmund threw down his singlestick and raced out of the tower and down the stairs as if he could not get away fast enough.

  Had this been any other manor, Edmund would have been sent for lessons in reading and speaking French after breakfast, but there was no one to teach him. However, he was also Pentre’s squire, and Pentre had decided to go hunting, so Edmund spent the remainder of the morning gathering the lord’s equipment, saddling and tacking horses, as they prepared to depart.

  The keepers, meanwhile, had let the dogs out of their kennel, and although there were only five of them, they created more noise and confusion than three times that number, some jumping the fences where the goats and pigs were kept so that people had to dash about keeping them out of trouble.

  Eventually, Pentre and Walcot emerged from the hall as the grooms brought their horses. The dogs knew what this meant and they crowded about the horses without any slackening of their loud enthusiasm; if anything, the clamor grew in volume. But the horses and dogs seemed to know each other very well, for none of the horses shied away, as they often did when dogs were about, for not all dogs were friends of horses, and no dog got stepped on or kicked.

  As the hunting party of a dozen mounted men rode out the gate, Edmund showed Stephen his finger.

  Stephen looked forward to an afternoon of leisure once the hunters departed, which he intended to use to solve the riddle of how to get a look inside the kitchen storeroom and the pantry without arousing anyone’s interest or suspicions. However, Edgar called the remaining archers together and led them out to the field east of the castle, where archery butts had been set up.

  “You first, Wistwode,” Edgar said. “Let’s see if you’re as good with a bow as you are with a stick.”

  “Better, even,” Stephen said with bravado he did not feel. He had not expected to have to prove his skill with the bow, though he should have seen this coming.

  “That farthest one,” Edgar said. “See if you can hit it.”

  That particular butt, which was hard to distinguish from a sheaf of corn, was at least two-hundred yards away. Several pigs, their winter fur thick and black, could be seen rooting among the stubble and patches of snow not far f
rom it.

  “If I miss and hit a pig, what happens?” Stephen asked.

  “You better miss the pigs. They belong to the lord.”

  “I’ll do my best.”

  “See that you do.”

  At this distance, the object was to see how close you got to the butt, since pin-point accuracy was hard to achieve. Archery obtained its effect by the fall of massed shot in a small location, although the really good men could put an arrow through a circle as round as a man’s head at a hundred yards.

  “Right,” Stephen said, nocking his arrow, mindful to slide it under the string and over the stave from the rear rather that lay them over both as many amateurs were prone to do.

  He fixed his eyes on the butt. A pig wandered within yards of it, then around behind it. He felt wind on his cheeks, and glanced down at a few of the surviving stalks of grass to gauge its direction. He would have to correct for the windage, which always threw off long shots, but it was hard to tell how much. He took a deep breath, held it, and raised the bow as he drew the string under his ear. The strain was so great that he wanted to groan, the string dug into his fingers so that he could barely hold on, and his arms threatened to shake, which surely would have betrayed him as a fake. As the arrowhead pointed to the place in the clouds which he hoped would send it true, he released the string, taking the vicious slap on his forearm without flinching, for even with the leather cover it still hurt.

  The arrow bolted away and sailed upward, seeming to slow down as it receded. There had always been something about the flight of an arrow that stirred Stephen’s heart: the joy and hope when they were your own sailing at the enemy as they flew upward, hung in midair, and then sank like birds of prey toward the enemy line; dread as they soared upward from enemy archers and then plunged toward you so that you watched them fall, praying, keeping your eyes on them until the last moment, when you ducked behind your shield for what protection it could provide. Although this was an outgoing arrow, Stephen watched it with dread, fearful that it would sail wide. It reached its greatest height and fell to earth, slowly at first and then gaining speed, the yellow and red on the shaft nearly lost to sight against the gray cloud and barren gray hills beyond.

  The arrow struck some distance short of the butt.

  Edgar grunted. “At least you missed the pigs.”

  Stephen shot again five times, the arrows falling around the butt, but by no more than ten feet or so. “Is that good enough for you?”

  “You’re already hired. It will have to,” Edgar said. “At least that fool Walcot is paying you, not our lord. Go fetch your arrows and run off those pigs.”

  “Hey!” said a Walcot man. “Watch what you say about him.”

  “You’re the one told me he was a fool,” Edgar said, as Stephen set out across the field.

  “Our lord is a fool?” Stephen asked the man who had protested as the group headed back toward the castle.

  The fellow looked glum and shrugged. “He’s no fool, but he’s made, well, mistakes.”

  “Oh.” Stephen was curious about what those might be, as well as anything the soldiers might say about the robberies and barn burnings. But he could not ask outright about such things for fear of igniting suspicions. He could only let the men talk, as soldiers could be depended on to do. “Not any that got someone killed, I hope.”

  “Worse. Lost our homes because of it.”

  “That’s pretty bad.” Losing your home was a disaster, because it meant losing everything you owned. “How’d that happen?”

  The fellow walked on a few paces. “FitzAllen ordered Walcot down here to help Pentre. We came in November just before the trouble. When it broke out, he decided to stay here. Said it would violate his orders if we went home. The Welsh came and burned our village.”

  “Why’d FitzAllen send you here?” Stephen asked.

  “You haven’t figured that out?”

  They walked on again for a few more paces. Stephen said, “I don’t suppose there’s anything you could have done anyway.”

  “There weren’t but ten or so of the bastards,” the man said bitterly. “We could have shown them off.” The soldier added, “And we’re stuck here. Can’t even get back to rebuild.”

  “But you’re being paid.”

  “We’re supposed to. It’s been a while. For all the work we do, you’d think it’d come more regularly.”

  When they got back to the castle, Edgar put Stephen on gate ward. Many castle gates had a niche built into the gate tower with a bench for the ward, but this castle had nothing of the kind, except a stool, which he was expected to occupy. It was a job almost as boring as night guard, although it offered the chance of conversation to anyone who came through. Nobody did, though, except the village vicar, and he wasn’t disposed to talk, not even a “Good day” as he came, and later, went. The sight of the vicar gave Stephen an idea. Vicars knew everything that went on in a village.

  The hunting party returned shortly before sundown with two red deer stags and a wild boar, a young sow by the small size of it, although even young sows could be quite large. Edmund was excited because they had flushed a bear, but Pentre had had enough by then and had called off the dogs. It was too late in the day to do anything but send the carcasses to the kitchen for dressing, and Pentre announced they would feast tomorrow, everyone, including the archers and the servants, who ordinarily were not entitled to eat wild game.

  “Ralph should be back from Clun with our share of the takings tomorrow,” Pentre said, “and we’ll make it a celebration! Now get this game to the kitchen!”

  In the excitement, nobody protested that tomorrow would be a Friday, which was reserved for fish, seasoned with lots of prayers, perhaps because they would have been left to eat salted haddock, while the rest got steaks, liver, kidneys, and tongues. Even the gristle of wild game was seen as a delicacy by those who hardly ever got any, legally anyway; salt and a good boiling made anything edible.

  Pentre, Walcot, and Edmund went into the hall, where supper was being set out for them, followed by those soldiers and servants not engaged in that task, for nobody liked to miss a meal if it could be helped, while the cook’s boys fetched the game into the kitchen for butchering.

  No one came to relieve Stephen, as even the ward in the tower above him came down and crossed the bailey.

  Although it was tempting to follow, Stephen had the feeling this was a test, which he would fail if he abandoned the gate. At this time of day, it was doubtful there would be any visitors, so he closed the gate, and climbed to the tower’s guardroom, where he pushed open all the shutters so that he could keep an eye on the approaches to the castle.

  Edgar sent out the night watch, which relieved Stephen at sundown. The guard commander told him that he could get some scraps in the kitchen if he didn’t tarry so long that the servants ate them.

  The only folk in the kitchen were a couple of boys washing pots and wooden trenchers under the eye of an assistant cook.

  “What do you want?” the cook asked.

  “I missed supper.”

  “What were you up to, chasing the girls in the village?”

  “I was on guard. The watch commander said you’d feed me.”

  “He’s pretty generous with the lord’s fare.”

  “Come on, some bread, a bit of cheese, and whatever scraps you have left. If my growling stomach keeps the boys awake tonight, I’ll make sure you’re the one to pay for the trouble.”

  The assistant cook, a beefy man with two chins, was not the least intimidated. “Too fucking bad for you. There’s nothing left.” He waved at the two boys toiling over the buckets. “The boys there got hold of the remainder. Polished it right off, didn’t you, boys?”

  “There’s some bread left,” one of the boys said. “In the pantry.”

  “I’ll take it,” Stephen said, snatching up the single candle on the table and moving around the pair to the pantry doors before either of them could volunteer to help.

 
The assistant cook followed him and stood in the doorway so that he could keep an eye on Stephen and the boys at the same time.

  Stephen found the leftover bread in a sack on the top of a barrel of dried apples. He opened the sack slowly, taking the opportunity to look around as well as he could, and removed a quarter loaf of black rye.

  “Hurry up, there,” the assistant cook said, not liking an unauthorized person in his pantry.

  “Are you sure I can’t have one of those?” Stephen asked pointing to three sausages dangling from a beam overhead besides bags of plums and onions.

  “No,” the cook said.

  “Well, what about some butter, then?” Stephen asked. “This crust is hard as a rock.”

  “Butter won’t soften it any, but there’s some over there.” The cook indicated a clay pot by the fire.

  “How about some salt for the butter?”

  “You are a picky eater,” the cook said.

  “There’s salt on the shelf just below the butter,” one of the boys said. “That little barrel there.”

  Stephen crossed to the shelves and knelt by the barrel the boy had indicated. He could have just removed the top to get at the salt, but he set the barrel down on the ground, turning it as he did so, holding his breath about what he hoped to see.

  And it was there: the dandelion mark burned into one of the slats.

  “Pretty little mark,” he said as off-handedly as he could.