by Tamara Leigh
A good plan, for Lavonne and D’Arci would never expect her to remain on the barony of Abingdale.
CHAPTER FIVE
Purley Abbey, April 1157
Beneath their noses. For more than a month she had sheltered among the ruins of Purley Abbey less than three leagues south of Broehne Castle, but for all those who passed by, none knew of her presence. Even the ones who sheltered among the crumbling walls during the thunderous spring rains gained no glimpse of her.
Beatrix raised her face to the sunlight that flooded the roofless presbytery, a place that had some hundred years past housed the high altar. As its roof was absent, few ventured near, and then only the occasional scavenger hoping to uncover a relic.
When trespassed upon, she retreated to the crypt beneath the presbytery that had been used for the safe-keeping of such relics. Fortunately, none hazarded past the false crypt that had been constructed fifty feet in front of the true crypt. The ceiling of the former having collapsed, it yawned wide and empty, offering seekers little more than a nasty tumble. As for the true crypt, were its location discovered, one would be disappointed by its spoils. But it was everything to Beatrix, its vaulted ceiling having sheltered her while she waited. And waited.
When would her brothers come? She could not remain at Purley past autumn when the chill winter so recently left behind set in again and the fear of being discovered once more denied her a warming fire. If no one came for her, she would have to seek Stern Castle on her own.
As always, the thought of making her way across unfamiliar land among unknown people was daunting. Noble or common, no woman was safe traveling alone, especially one who had difficulty expressing herself. She would be prey to many, one of whom might be Michael D’Arci.
Lifting an arm from the mantle she had taken from him, Beatrix fingered the scar beneath her hair that D’Arci’s stitches had made. D’Arci who had saved her life that he might see it taken.
The vibration started at Beatrix’s toes, swept to her heels, and shuddered up her calves. Though she knew the riders were too distant and would not likely glance at the abbey ruins amid the dense undergrowth, she slipped behind the presbytery wall.
Seeking reassurance, she glanced over her shoulder beyond the false crypt to the grassy, stone-strewn floor where the high altar had once been raised. The narrow breach in the ceiling of the true crypt lay ten feet in back of the crumbling pillars. In less than a five count she could be down it. A two count later, the false floor she had constructed of branches, leaves, and grass would be positioned over the breach. None who ventured to the easternmost boundary of the abbey would know she hid fifteen feet below.
Beatrix peered around the wall as the vibrations increased and riders appeared. Unfortunately, since they passed at great speed and were too distant, she could not ascertain whether her brothers were among them. But it had to be urgency that drove them so hard and fast.
She knew what she had to do—as she had done thrice before. Beneath cover of her stolen mantle, she would steal into Broehne Castle. Though it was a terrible risk, it would be more terrible if her family came and she could not be found.
Closing her mind to the fear that tried to dissuade her from straying from the abbey, she stepped from the wall. She halted. Was she forgetting something? She squeezed her eyes closed, but though she searched, nothing revealed itself.
With calloused hands, she wrenched the hood of the mantle over her head. And caught the scent of the man to whom it belonged.
Of my imagining. No scent of him could remain, especially after all the rain the garment has endured.
Determining that first she would go to the nearby village she occasionally braved in hopes of hearing of her family, she drew the mantle closed and glanced down to confirm that no red was visible. In doing so, she noted that the uppers of the boots she had bought from a village boy had further separated from their soles. God willing, she would not need them much longer.
Fear curdled the meager contents of Beatrix’s belly as she peered up from beneath her hood at the castle she had fled a month past. The talk of the villagers having yielded nothing of value, she had continued on to Broehne.
As she followed behind a wagon that rumbled over the drawbridge, she prayed no one would stop her, that it would be assumed she was with the villager who delivered milk and cheese to the baron’s kitchens. There were others who came, whether to grind grain at the lord’s mill or give service to their lord, but there was less chance of being stopped providing she stayed near the wagon. And so it was, though the momentary pause beneath the portcullis made her heart gallop.
Continuing to trail the wagon, she strained to catch the talk around her, but too many spoke at once, their voices entangling such that she caught only single words above the crunch of wagon wheels.
The inner bailey, she told herself. It would not be as riotous there, though certainly more dangerous. Passing into it, she squinted at the great donjon and was touched with faintness beget not only of fear, but too little sustenance. Though she filled her aching belly with various vegetation and had become proficient at spearing fish from the stream, failing that, she snatched simple viands from the villagers. However, it was never enough, and often she went hungry.
As she sent up a prayer that she would not collapse, her belly grunted again. What she wouldn’t give for a swallow of milk, a bite of bread—
“You there!” a woman called.
Beatrix looked to the servant who came off the steps before the donjon and was relieved to discover it was another she addressed.
“Bring the wagon ‘round to the kitchen,” the servant directed the villager.
Beatrix drew a deep breath. She had not come this far to fall into Baron Lavonne’s hands. She would learn what there was to know and be gone.
As the servant led the way for the villager, Beatrix skirted those who came between her and the wagon. Hanging back, she allowed the wagon to disappear around the side of the donjon before following lest the villager or servant became suspicious. At the gated entrance to the kitchen through which the wagon passed, she slipped alongside the wall and behind a tree.
“Our lord be well?” the villager asked among huffs as he unloaded milk and cheese.
“Well enough,” the woman said without strain, evidencing she offered no assistance.
For some minutes, the two chatted about little of import, but just when Beatrix despaired of ever gaining tidings of her family, the villager said, “Any word of our lord’s betrothed?”
Beatrix caught her breath.
“Naught. At least, naught that he allows these poor ears to hear.”
Surely that was good. Though Beatrix had weeks earlier learned from talk in the village that Gaenor had never arrived at Broehne Castle, that was all she knew.
“Methinks he ought to choose another bride,” the man said with a grunt.
“Aye, but ‘twould seem he wants this one.”
He wanted Gaenor? But was it not the king who had ordered the marriage?
“A Wulfrith, eh? He has his reasons, I am sure.”
“That he does.”
Revenge.
The woman sighed. “Of course, since the murder of Sir Simon, the baron’s father is more opposed than ever to such a union. Woe to the lady, Beatrix, if ever she is found. And woe to her sister if she yet weds her family’s enemy. Though old Aldous may spend his wasting life abed, still he can work ill where he wills.”
What would Christian Lavonne and his father do to Gaenor if she fell into their hands? Deciding she had heard enough, Beatrix crept from behind the tree.
“We will require twice as much cheese on the morrow,” the servant said.
“Guests?”
Beatrix paused to learn who had passed near Purley Abbey.
“Baron Cuthbert brought a fair-sized entourage with him.”
With a sigh, Beatrix slipped away. When she reached the gatehouse, she gained the side of a corpulent woman who lugged a sack of milled fl
our. Keeping her chin down, she stayed with the woman halfway across the drawbridge, then surged ahead and nearly collided with a horse and rider.
It was the horse that caused fear to leap through her—some vague memory having roused an aversion to the animals she had once loved. As she murmured an apology to the rider whose leg she brushed against, a familiar scent teased her, but she had no time for it. She needed her sanctuary. Now.
Michael turned in the saddle and frowned at the slight, mantled figure hastening opposite. It was not a chill day. In fact, he had removed his own mantle after departing Castle Soaring hours past.
Remembering the welcoming arms of the wench he had left behind, he silently cursed the order that he present himself at Broehne Castle. Though Aldous Lavonne likely sought Michael’s services as a physician, he and his son surely wished to know the result of the continuing search for Beatrix Wulfrith.
Michael gripped the reins tighter. A month had passed and still there was no word of the woman’s whereabouts. All that was known for certain was that she had not returned to her family, for they believed her dead, as told by the sister who was said to have seen a bloodied Beatrix in the ravine. And Baron Lavonne had made no attempt to correct them. Thus, despite the absence of her body, which a delegation sent by the king’s men had determined must have fallen prey to scavengers, the Wulfriths mourned their lost sister. Eventually, though, they would come in search of answers—would surely have done so before now had the eldest brother not been compelled to accompany the king to Wales. Doubtless, King Henry believed it would allow Garr Wulfrith time to cool his anger. The younger brothers could growl, snap, and claw all they liked, but lacking the bite of their older brother, there was little they could do. For now.
And that gave Michael time to hunt down Beatrix Wulfrith. Though he knew it was possible she had, indeed, become fodder for animals of one sort or another, something told him she had either begged sanctuary at an abbey or gone to ground. Despite her head injury, the wisp of a woman was cunning.
Recalling her accusation against Simon, he rumbled low in his throat. Wherever she was—he fingered the small scar caused by the goblet she had brought down on his head—he would find her.
“My lord!” One of three accompanying knights drew alongside. “Something is amiss?”
Michael looked away from the mantled figure, but not before a flash of red caught his eye. He frowned at the aging Sir Canute. “Naught is amiss—”
He jerked his head around and stared at the lower edge of the black mantle worn by the one who had blundered into his path. Had he imagined red? Surely she would not have returned to Broehne…
He reined his destrier around. “Tell Baron Lavonne I shall attend his father shortly.”
The knight’s face, resembling the bark of a gnarled tree, furrowed deeper. “You know the old man’s temper, Michael.”
Canute’s concern, ever fatherly though they were of no relation, gave Michael pause. Now that Michael was keeper of Soaring, his old friend rarely addressed him by his Christian name. Only in privacy and matters of urgency did he lapse into the familiarity that Michael missed of their days as knights errant.
Michael eased his heels from his mount’s sides, leaned toward the man, and gripped his shoulder. “You worry too much for me, old friend. Pray, ease your mind. I shall return anon.”
“I ought to go with you.”
“Anon,” Michael repeated. As he guided his mount over the drawbridge, he told himself it was a fool’s quest. But it was the nearest he had come these past weeks. Aldous Lavonne could wait.
Beatrix tossed the hood back, lifted her face, and smiled at the distant clouds through which golden light filtered. “Again, You deliver me.”
She hastened down the nave and skirted the false crypt. Before the remains of the high altar, she loosened the mantle and let it fall from her shoulders. Grateful for its absence that had flushed her with warmth, she glanced at the inner crimson and conjured a vision of the man to whom the garment belonged. Soon she need not worry about him, for on the return journey she had decided she would not wait for winter to journey to Stern Castle. She would give her family another sennight, and if they did not come, she would brave the wood and roads. It was a fearsome thing, but she wearied of the helplessness of waiting on something that might never appear—of hiding like a coward.
Smoothing the woolen tunic “borrowed” from the pack of a knight who had paused at Purley Abbey, she lowered to her knees.
The Pater Noster, she decided and squeezed her eyes closed to remember words that had once been as if written on her lips.
“Our Father in heaven…hallowed…” Though she faltered through the words, they were all there, unlike the memories that yet eluded. And that was something over which to rejoice.
“Lead us not into temptation,” she finished, “but deliver us from the evil one.”
“Do you truly believe He hears the prayers of a murderess?”
Heart staggering, Beatrix opened her eyes wide and struggled to make sense of the voice that should not be in this place. At last, she recalled the scent that had whispered through her on the drawbridge. It was Michael D’Arci she had brushed against. And something about their brief encounter had made him follow the hooded figure that hurried past him.
Slowly, Beatrix rose. Keeping her back to him, searching beyond the altar for an escape, her gaze stuttered over the breach in the ceiling of the true crypt. She gasped at the realization that this was what had eluded her before she had earlier departed the abbey. The false floor that she always took care to place over the breach lay where she had dropped it upon climbing from the crypt this morn.
Fool! But even had she covered the crypt, her hiding place was of no use now. Or was it? She slid her gaze to the ambulatory where once monks had walked and beyond that to the remains of a lesser chapel. D’Arci would follow. Unfortunately, if he had others with him, her plotting would see no light. But if he had come alone…
Though her conscience recoiled, she reminded herself he was no different from his brother. No consideration had he shown her and none must she show him.
“Lady Beatrix once more lacks for words?”
Deliver us from the evil one.
She turned and saw D’Arci stood thirty feet back. Shoulder braced against a column that had once supported a roof, arms folded over a broad chest, he projected the air of one who had won a deciding game. And even at this distance, there was no mistaking the victory in his pale, gray eyes.
Why did he have to look so much like his brother? If not that he was a handful of years older and his dark hair sharply contrasted with Sir Simon’s blond, it would be the same man. However, she had not thought Sir Simon handsome. And Michael D’Arci was, though his eyes hated and his mouth twisted a smile that caused her fear to run faster. Though she told herself she cared not that he appeared to have suffered no lasting ill from the blow she had dealt him, she was relieved.
“I knew it was possible you had taken sanctuary at an abbey”—he swept his gaze around the ruins—“but this I did not expect.”
As she had known, just as she had known he would not overlook the abbeys in his search for her. Thus, she had not sought sanctuary for fear that a goodly purse of coin might buy it away. Better faith in herself than faith in corrupt men.
D’Arci straightened. “I say again, do you think God hears the prayers of a murderess?”
She looked to the left and right of him. He appeared to have come alone.
He took a step toward her, causing sunlight to streak his sword hilt.
“God hears the prayers of all,” she slipped the words past her lips before fear could smite them.
“Even those of my brother?”
In another life, she would have laughed, but there was nothing humorous about the panic rising in her breast and spreading thought to thought. She clenched her hands. If she could only be more angry than fearful, she might clear this impassable bridge.
Calling on
her memory of that night at Broehne Castle when D’Arci had implied she was witless, she said, “Have you another brother, Lord D’Arci? For surely…” Her throat constricted. “…you do not speak of the same who made to…” Her voice trailed off and lids fluttered as she struggled to piece the fragmented word together. “…who made to violate me.”
She envied the anger that leapt from his face. Were hers so large, nothing would stopper her mind or tongue.
“Will you come to me,” he growled, “or I to you?”
Where was his horse? In the wood? Aye, it would not do to announce himself sooner and be denied her torment.
She took a step back. “I am no fool, Lord—” She cast about for his name, but it had gone into hiding. Embarrassment warmed her. Perhaps she was a fool.
“Aye, you are a fool, Lady Beatrix,” he concurred and strode forward.
For a moment, she could not move, but then survival roused her and she turned and ran. Praying her feet would fall such that she spanned the crypt without drawing attention to the narrow breach, praying D’Arci—aye, that was his name—would not clear it, she landed her foot on the other side.
Though she winced in anticipation of his fall through the crypt, no sound rent the air. Or mayhap her blood rushed too loud to hear? Reaching the lesser chapel, she glanced over her shoulder.
D’Arci followed, though without urgency. But then, what had he to run for when he believed her only escape was past him? She swung around to face him and suppressed the impulse to look to the breach. Three more steps and—
“’Tis done,” he bit.
Now only one…
His foot landed at the center of the breach and, with a shout, he plunged through the ceiling. There was a thud and a resounding crack. Something had broken. His neck?
A moment later, the abbey ruins resounded with blasphemies.