Forbidden Forest

by Michael Cadnum

  “Sir Gilbert—” Margaret knew that one word, or two, and all harm would be undone, the day made bright and sound again.

  “He hurt you and you fought him back,” said Bridgit, closing her bedchamber door firmly behind her. She was in her morning robe, a flowing, voluminous garment.

  “No, he never came to me—” Margaret allowed herself to see the knife in her hand, the blood on her nightdress. She could not make another sound.

  “It cannot be so bad as it appears,” said Bridgit.

  It is far worse. Margaret could not say this, but willed the words through the dark dawn light, into Bridgit’s heart.

  “God’s teeth,” said Bridgit, cursing like a fighting man.

  “He is still warm,” said Bridgit.

  “Sometimes a surgeon shakes a stricken person,” said Margaret, her voice barely a whisper, “and the breath awakens in the dying body.”

  “No shaking will stir Sir Gilbert, my lady.”

  Margaret wept, trembling so hard she nearly dropped the fine, slender blade in her hands.

  Bridgit raised a hand, telling her to hush. She listened, her head to one side. “The house is pork-drunk,” she said.

  Margaret could barely understand a word Bridgit was saying.

  “They are stiff with wine, my lady,” said Bridgit.

  “Bridgit, awaken the servants.”

  “We will get into our clothes without a sound.”

  Margaret steadied her voice. “Have the porter run for the sheriff’s men—”

  “Hush!”

  “A murderer is in the streets,” said Margaret, “and we must have him in chains, Bridgit, before he escapes.”

  “Put down the knife, my lady,” said Bridgit.

  The thing was sticky. Margaret shuddered—this blood would never wash clean, halfway up her arms.

  Bridgit put a firm, dry hand over Margaret’s mouth.

  “They will think you have killed him, my lady,” she said. “Or Henry the deputy will say I have done it. We must speak to your father.”

  Whenever there was a murder in the kingdom, the local sheriff appointed five knights to investigate the crime and determine the guilty party. There was no other regular means for discovering guilt or innocence. Margaret knew that with so many knights at war in the Holy Land, any person even remotely under suspicion would be wise to seek refuge in a monastery or some other place of sanctuary until the murder could be solved.

  Not only should she and Bridgit seek a safe place, but William Lea, too, should be warned. Otherwise a deceitful deputy such as Henry would squeeze money from all of them or, even worse, turn them over to Nottingham’s rack until confessions could be tortured loose.

  The two women dressed quietly, each in a simple gown and hood. Margaret was obedient under the ministering touch of Bridgit, but burning with questions and trembling.

  Dressing took very little time, and then, cocking her head every few moments to listen, Bridgit opened the marriage chest. She rummaged briefly through the contents. Spying the ruby-and-sapphire ring brooch on a side table, she pressed it into Margaret’s pouch. Then she led the way out of the chamber and down the stairs.

  The dining hall was like a battlefield, the wine-slain sprawled and unmoving. On the benches, on the broad wooden tables, snoring men lay inert and gaping, vomit and spilled wedding wine in the rushes scattered thickly over the floor. A torpid figure had blood on his sleeves—Hal, Margaret thought, or perhaps Lionel. One of the wine-stunned guests was Henry, and he alone was stirring, blinking, trying to lift his head.

  Bridgit whispered, “Follow me, my lady, and never make a sound.”

  It was only as they approached the spicery, the home of Margaret’s father, that they began to hear the chink, chink of chain mail behind them in the otherwise empty street.

  When they turned to look back, there was no one.

  Bridgit pounded on the door to the spicery, knelt to squint into the keyhole, and pounded again.

  Hygd opened the door just a crack, blinking in the early morning light, and Bridgit thrust her out of the way. “Go rouse your master and tell him your ladyship needs to speak with him.”

  Hygd gaped.

  “This very moment, Hygd,” said Bridgit, “if you would be so kind as to move your arms and legs.”

  “Good Bridgit, my lady—” began Hygd, looking from one to the other.

  “Look at poor Hygd, staring around,” said Bridgit, trying to soften her impatience. “Hygd, we’re not ghosts, we’re two living folk—”

  “Master William took to horse,” said Hygd, “just before the first bird.”

  “Where did he go?” asked Bridgit, seizing Hygd’s shoulder.

  Hygd stood straight, bearing the pain of Bridgit’s grip. “He said he hired a good horse. And he said, ‘Blessings on you, good Hygd. I have lived to be a happy man.’ And I heard the hooves as he set forth riding fast.”

  “Before every baby in a cradle grows a beard,” said Bridgit, “tell us where he went.”

  “On his way to London,” Hygd sang out, “to buy spices with the marriage money, I do believe.”

  A heavy fist pounded on the door.

  “Tell whoever it is you’ve seen no one and heard nothing,” said Bridgit.

  “Don’t open it,” said Margaret.

  Someone heavy was slamming his weight against the door. Its iron hinges had been smithed down the street by Carr the local anvil master. They were well made, Margaret knew, but never put to such a test.

  The door latch snapped, and the door crashed open. Henry, the sheriff’s man, fell into the room.

  Chapter 23

  “Where is your husband, Lady Margaret?” asked Henry, drawing his sword with some effort.

  He was still dressed in the finery of the day before, though his rich tunic was wrinkled and stained at the hem. Despite the absence of chain mail, his sword belt was buckled fast, and his broadsword’s edge was keen blue in the dawn that lanced through the open door behind him.

  “I trust—” began Margaret, crossing her hands on her breast. That he is with the sacred host who protected him in life. “He is at peace, wherever he may be.”

  Bridgit offered, in a tone of unnatural sweetness, “Henry de Law, we have no knowledge of Sir Gilbert as we stand here.”

  Henry made the sound of laughter. “Ha!” It was not a real laugh, but something at once fierce and uncertain. He made a cut in the air with his sword, not to menace them so much as to reassure himself that he was armed. “I’m drunk.”

  “Such illness passes,” said Bridgit, in a tone of compassionate primness.

  “And you think you can stitch me up with words.” He leveled the sword at Margaret, and the blade was steady. “I have cause to think that Sir Gilbert’s wedding night was less than happy.”

  “Who told you this, sheriff’s man?” said Margaret in her best her-ladyship voice.

  “A man of law worth his mutton,” said Henry, lowering his sword, “sees who wakes up in the morning, and who does not.”

  “I wish to speak with the lord sheriff himself,” said Margaret.

  Henry put the point of his sword on the wooden floor and leaned on the weapon. This was considered swinish manners—the point left a mark in the flooring, and was often dulled by the planks. Further, it mocked the dignity of the weapon.

  Patch the mouser sat yawning in the door to the workroom. He scratched himself, and Margaret was caught by the ordinary, everyday sound of the cat washing his paws. She still believed in her heart that one right word to Heaven and the day would begin all over again, all harm vanished.

  “Where is your father?” asked Henry.

  “He has taken to the road,” said Margaret, ignoring Bridgit’s urgent gesture.

  “So the murderer flies,” said Henry.

  All three women protested at once, Hygd breaking into tears. Henry sat slowly, lowering himself to a stool. He lifted a hand for silence.

  “There has been no murder,” said Bridgit,
her voice carrying above the others. “You are mad.”

  “I have spoken badly,” he said, leaning his sword against the table. “I spend much time convincing the lord sheriff that I have the wits of a tame, trustworthy house hound. I play the idiot so well that I forget how to speak.” He ran his tongue over his lips. “Of the knight’s death there is no doubt.”

  Margaret parted her lips, but Bridgit silenced her by squeezing her arm. “Not every death is a murder, wise Henry,” said Bridgit.

  Henry closed his eyes and opened them. “These two eyes have told me that this one is.”

  “Why would my father kill my—” Margaret could not say my husband. She fought to keep from weeping in the presence of this sheriff’s brute, but Hygd’s sobs were infectious.

  “To protect his daughter, some might say, from a knight with a violent humor,” offered Henry. He had a field man’s accent, but had spent enough time in the castle of the lord sheriff that something of the law’s tone had seeped into his speech. And the smile he gave was apologetic, even kind. “I might do the same, if I had a daughter.”

  “My father is not a killer.” But to say it, Margaret realized, sounded almost like a lie, father and killer alive in the same breath.

  Henry belched thoughtfully. “The town saw how angry you were to see your husband-to-be bruising a juggler.”

  “And the town saw my lady obedient in her wedding mantle,” protested Bridgit.

  “Maybe Sir Gilbert tried to teach the lady Margaret using his fists and his feet,” said Henry, “and the new wife used that pretty black-handled knife when Sir Gilbert turned his back.” He pronounced the name Gill-burt, rolling the r.

  Patch padded into the room, pausing when he saw Henry. A street pig snuffled along the lane outside, and put its mobile snout across the threshold. The black-and-white tomcat flicked his tail, and did not move until the pig had sniffed the entryway and wandered off again.

  “What do you want from us?” asked Bridgit.

  Henry gave a grand sigh. “The lord sheriff is busy with taxes. He judges property, he weighs fishing rights and meets with the Exchequer’s man. The lord sheriff does not like to hear of dead bridegrooms.”

  “Speak plainly,” said Bridgit.

  “If the lord sheriff hears of a murder, he will give the likely killers to Nottingham, who will use his high skill to tickle the truth from their lips. You, my lady. Your attendant. Your kitchen servant. Your father. Especially your good father, that gentle man. All at the hands of skilled Nottingham. I shall not tell my lord the sheriff of Sir Gilbert’s death—for a while.”

  Henry looked around then, as though someone had uttered his name. “Good ladies,” he said. “Have you any morning ale?”

  Before Bridgit could move to stop her, Margaret withdrew her mother’s brooch from her pouch, and placed it in Henry’s hand.

  “What is this?” he asked.

  “Rubies and sapphires,” groaned Bridgit, putting her hands to her head. She would not look at Margaret. “And silver. Beyond price.”

  “Oh,” said Henry.

  He let the brooch rest in the flat of his hand.

  “In exchange for seeking the rightful killer of my husband, Henry Castle,” said Margaret.

  Henry frowned deliberately, pinning the ornament to the front of his tunic, forcing the pin through the thick fabric. He nodded, no doubt savoring the thought of this possible name for himself. Henry Stonecastle. Henry Tower.

  Margaret could not bear the sight of her mother’s brooch as he pulled out his tunic to examine it.

  “You will leave us now,” said Bridgit.

  Henry gave her a look of innocent surprise.

  “You may go,” said Bridgit.

  “The widow of a knight is a wealthy woman,” said Henry. Patch approached him experimentally, and the sheriff’s man reached down and scratched the cat between the ears. “And fine stones like these will run through her fingers like water.”

  “We have nothing more to give you,” said Margaret.

  “I have you, my ladies,” said Henry.

  Bridgit took a step forward, and Henry’s eyes grew small. “I have you in your person, bone and blood.”

  “Henry Privymouse,” said Bridgit carefully, enunciating with high-mannered clarity. “Henry Ratflea.”

  Henry seized his sword and gave a vicious cut at Patch. The cat tumbled and loosed a full-throated howl. Then he vanished from the room, cat hair drifting down in the light from the open door.

  “Poor Henry,” said Bridgit. “You have pissed your clothes.”

  Henry leaned over to examine himself, and Bridgit swung her fist. She caught him on the side of his neck. His knees buckled, and he reached to cling to her as she hit him again. This second blow staggered him, and he lurched against the table, using the heavy sword as a counterbalance to keep from falling. He failed.

  Henry was still moving, reaching for a table, groping for his sword, sitting up, grimacing. Margaret ran for a hearth shovel and held it over her head as Hygd hurried for a long yellow cord, stiff and angled from a shipment that had arrived months before.

  “My ladies, he is getting up,” said Hygd.

  He was rising in stages, up on one knee, groaning, faltering, seizing the table edge with one hand.

  A step crackled at the door, and the familiar armor of a sheriff’s man was in the entryway, the helmet too big, the chain mail too short. Henry held up a hand and reached. The sheriff’s deputy pulled him to his feet as Margaret kept the shovel cocked.

  “Arrest these women,” said Henry, sounding almost cheerful, “in the king’s name.”

  Chapter 24

  “Sire, it is done,” said the newcomer. “These women are as good as lost to sight of man and hen.” He helped Henry to a bench along a far wall, where, in more prosperous days, William the spicer’s customers would sit talking.

  “Man and hen,” echoed Henry thickly. He squinted up at the armored man. “I can’t recall your name.”

  “I am new to your service,” said the man, gathering the yellow hemp shipping cord from the floor.

  “Good lawmen,” said Margaret, speaking formally, “let my father’s servant, Hygd, and my attendant, Bridgit, go free.”

  “No, I’ll share the chains with you, my lady,” protested Hygd.

  Bridgit was staring at Henry and the new sheriff’s man, rubbing her knuckles where they had collided with Henry’s thick neck.

  The sheriff’s man whipped the cord around Henry’s wrists and ankles, looped it around his head, and eased the chief deputy to the floor before the stout man could protest. Then the quick-handed man lifted the helmet from his head and said, “These are bandages, sire, to keep your hurts from bleeding.”

  “Am I bleeding?” said Henry.

  Osric the juggler turned from his work and gave Margaret a bow.

  He presented Margaret with her mother’s brooch, and she accepted it. It was oily from contact with Henry’s hands and from the grime of fat and house smoke that saturated his clothing.

  “We must hurry from here, my ladies,” Osric said.

  “I will wait to speak with the lord sheriff himself,” said Margaret, unable to keep her voice from trembling.

  Henry had been examining his bindings with a frown. “Wait!” he exclaimed, adding a rude field phrase for the female privy parts. “You quintes ruwet,” he cried. “You have fastened me up with rope!”

  The city was awakening, a goose tethered to a cart hissing as they passed.

  Household slops, dumped steaming in the cool, early-summer morning, attracted an ancient sow and her brood. A smith’s bellows worked off in the poor district, the sound carrying all the way to this neighborhood of merchants, and the fragrance of new-baked bread filled Coney Lane.

  The first householders entered the street, bidding good-day, and Bridgit’s cheerful-sounding greeting in return dampened their suspicion at the sight of three cloaked travelers. The tawser at the lane’s end said, “Good morning to you,
Bridgit and—my lady.” No doubt the leather worker could not believe that Margaret hurried along in the wake of her attendant, on this of all mornings.

  Don’t say a word, Margaret reminded herself. And look no one in the eye.

  As they approached the city gates through the early-morning bustle of the street, the juggler bounded ahead, joking with the gatemen.

  “Do you trust Osric?” asked Margaret.

  “My lady,” Bridgit responded, “I fear Henry.”

  The city was behind them, the road empty. The forest was nearby, but the massive, broad heads of the oaks lifted up out of the shadows, a place entirely foreign to Margaret.

  “I’ll take you to a place of hiding,” said Osric.

  A worshipful place? Margaret wanted to ask. A church was considered sanctuary, safe from the fist of the law, but a fugitive seeking refuge in a church could be starved into surrendering by stubborn sheriff’s men. An abbey or priory would be ideal, but Margaret knew of no holy site in the woods.

  Margaret and Bridgit kept pace with the juggler, a long-legged man. They wore hoods, and looked like three people setting forth on a pilgrimage. Hygd had gone to hide with her brother in a quarter of the city called Smithfield that was given over to laboring folk, smiths’ assistants, and charcoal burners.

  As they walked, Bridgit reassured Margaret that Hygd could be secret in the poor district of town for years, like a mouse in a timber pile, but that a lady and her hand-servant could not hide there a single morning if there was a reward on their heads.

  “There won’t be a reward, surely,” said Margaret.

  “I fear so,” said the juggler.

  “But we’re not outlaws, Osric,” said Margaret, the sun warm through her woolen cloak.

  “I am called Osric atte Water, my lady,” said the juggler. “And I learned my craft in the greenwood. I know where a fugitive is safest—among the tallest oaks.”

  Margaret heard these words with a thrill, but with a touch of dread as well.

  No honest man lived in the forest.

  The woods closed in around them, shafts of cold darkness.

  The huge oaks, and squalling birds.