A Friar's Bloodfeud: (Knights Templar 20) (7 page)

Isabel was worried about little Malkin. She might be old enough already to be widowed, but she seemed a child to Isabel still.
Since Ailward’s death, she spent too long just sitting and staring into the distance without speaking for long periods, her
expression bereft.

‘Mary? Mary?’ Isabel sighed. ‘Malkin, please …’

Mary seemed to come to with reluctance. ‘Mother?’

It was what, eighteen months since this young woman had become her daughter-in-law? And until Ailward’s
death Isabel had only ever seen her as happy, excited and enthusiastic. To see her green eyes grown so cold and empty was
torture. Nothing could rouse her. Since she had lost her husband, she had lost all her love for life.

Isabel held her arms wide, and Malkin stood and crossed the floor, walking into her embrace.

It was impossible for Isabel to find the words to explain her own devastation in the face of such tragic despair. For Isabel
this was merely the latest in a series of losses. Her life for the last ten years seemed to have been one of continual mourning.
Well, she would not sit and wail again, no matter how much she missed her son. She was the daughter of a squire, the wife
of another, and mother of a sergeant. She was proud.

Malkin had lost no one before, though, and she wept freely on Isabel’s shoulder. The girl felt so frail and soft to the older
woman, it surprised her that she had been able to conceive her child. There was no strength to her, not like the women of
Isabel’s age who were so used to death and trying to survive in the worst of conditions.

‘I must seem pathetic!’ Malkin murmured. ‘I am so sorry, Mother. But I miss him so – and I don’t know how I can live without
him …’

‘Child, you know nothing of the world, do you? You are young. Yes, it is right to grieve for your man, but when you are as
old as me you will realise that there are always fresh losses. All you can do is weather each storm that comes, and try to
protect those who still matter.’

She looked down at Malkin’s head approvingly. The chit was soft, but she had adored Isabel’s son, and that was enough to endear
her to Isabel.

Malkin nodded and sat up, her head averted as though
she was ashamed of her outburst. She stood and returned to her stool, picking up her wool and taking a deep, shuddering breath
before counting each stitch on her knitting needle.

She was beautiful – there could be no doubt of that. Her blue-black hair was iridescent as a raven’s wing, and her face was
delightfully shaped: a broad, white brow that curved down to a pointed little chin. With green eyes slanted down at the sides,
and full lips, even now in the depths of her misery she was a delight to the eye. It was no surprise that she’d stolen Ailward’s
heart. More surprising was that she’d been prepared to accept his advances.

Isabel was no fool; nor was she prepared to attribute characteristics even to her own son that were better than he possessed.
Ailward was a bullying, covetous fool, who could, maybe, have made a good sergeant given time, but had died first. Not that
his foolishness affected Malkin’s opinion of him, apparently. She seemed to have genuinely adored him. There had never been
any tears about the place while he lived, and she had always been doting. Perhaps it was true, the old idea that love blinded
a young wench to her man’s true character. If blindness were ever needed, it was in the lover of Isabel’s son.

She sighed. Already an old woman at four and fifty, she was lonely, and unlike the widow in front of her had little chance
of ever winning another man.

‘Sad, Mother?’ Malkin asked softly.

It would have been easy to snap at her. What did she have to be sad about? No father, no husband, no son … not many even
in the last decade had been forced to contend with so much despair. Isabel felt her eyes sting, but she blinked the tears
away before they could form. ‘No, child. I was just remembering. There’s no need for sadness, not when the
good Lord is protecting us at all times. My son is gone to a better place.’

‘Of course.’

The arrival of the steward prevented further discussion. Isabel held out her mazer for a refill of wine, and she watched as
Pagan filled it to the brim.

He was a good old servant, Pagan. It was one of the old Devonshire names. Nowadays all the young men of quality seemed to
have the same ones, even in the same family. Isabel knew one in which the oldest boy was called Guy, the following four sons
were all called John, and the last two were both William. She knew why it happened – any parent wanted a godparent to be as
committed to his offspring as possible, and so named the children after favoured friends. But if a favoured friend became
godparent to more than one of the children, it could lead to embarrassing and confusing multiple naming in the family. Isabel
was glad that she had only ever had to worry about the one boy. Much easier that way!

Pagan filled Malkin’s cup and then set the jug between the two women before leaving the room. He stood at the door, as usual,
eyeing both of them, his eyes going about the room: checking the fire was warm enough, that the shutters were pulled shut
against the cold evening air, that the dogs were settled out of the way so that they couldn’t upset the women. Only when he
was satisfied that they were as comfortable as they could be did he quietly draw the heavy curtain over the doorway and retreat
to his pantry to clear away the rubbish.

He was one man who could always be relied upon, Isabel thought. There were so many who were unreliable. Men who would steal
the rings from a widow’s fingers, who
would demand money before performing their services, who would eye her with a lascivious tenderness, hoping to receive a better
payment in kind for their efforts, or simply pocket a portion of the manor’s wealth and fly the place, never to return.

Pagan was not like them. A little younger than Isabel, his family had served Isabel’s dead husband’s for many years going
back into the dim and distant past. The fact that Pagan was still here was a measure of his commitment to them, and a proof
of his honour, although he was only a common peasant in truth. At the same time, knights who called themselves
honourable
were stealing manors from defenceless widows like her.

She gazed into the flames, lost in thought.

‘Mother? Are you well?’

Malkin’s soft voice drew her back to the present. ‘Yes! Of course I am,’ she snapped without thinking, and then regretted
her harshness. ‘I am sorry, Malkin. It’s just …’ She waved her hands feebly. ‘I don’t know how to say it.’

‘I know,’ Malkin said. Tears appeared in her eyes again. ‘I can’t think how to face life without my man.’

‘That is easy,’ Isabel said sternly. ‘You survive. I have lost three men now. My father, like my husband’s, killed by the
Scots in Ireland, Robert himself in that treacherous attack at Bridgnorth, and now my son. My beloved son …’

‘I loved him so much,’ Malkin said.

‘I know you did, little sweeting.’

‘It seems so hard to imagine that he’s gone.’

‘The thing to concentrate on for now is my grandson. You have to look after him, child. It is he who matters, who has to be
protected. No one else.’

Sir Baldwin de Furnshill stood in the cool morning air wearing only a thin linen shirt and a fine tunic of flaming crimson,
and drew his sword as he faced the rising sun on the grassy slope, tossing the scabbard aside on to the grass and standing
still a moment.

He was a tall man, broad and thickset about the shoulders and neck as befitted a warrior used to wearing armour, and his right
arm was more heavily muscled than his left from working with heavy weapons. Yet for all his warlike appearance, his face showed
a different quality. He lacked the brute arrogance and cruelty of so many modern knights. Instead, he had kindliness in his
dark brown eyes – kindliness and a sort of wariness, a man always slightly on guard. A thin beard followed the line of his
lower jaw. Once it had been dark, but now, like his hair, it was showing more and more grey. There was more salt than pepper,
his wife had said recently, and he could not deny it.

Today he felt unsettled, and it was not merely his wound: it was a curious manor, this, the small estate which had been his
wife’s first husband’s.

It had a lovely outlook, being some miles north of Tavistock but not quite on the moors, with a view of
Dartmoor itself. The manor house was a good, solid moorstone building, with sound grey walls, lately whitewashed (Baldwin
suspected because the local steward had heard that his mistress’s husband was coming to see the place) and thatched well only
the previous summer. It stood on a small knoll, as though on its own shallow motte, and all about it at a distance of some
sixty yards were woods, with the only bare aspect being to the south, where a man could see almost all the way to Brent Tor
on a clear day, so it was said. Sir Baldwin didn’t know about that, but he did know that today he needed to try his muscles.

Some three or four months ago he’d been the victim of an attack, and the encounter had nearly killed him. Even now, the wound
in his breast was enough to make his chest seize up when he over-exerted himself. The pain was normally a dull ache, but every
so often it grew into a flaming agony that seemed to threaten to rip his ribs apart. Last night had been one such occasion.

They had come here to Liddinstone a matter of a month ago. He had promised his wife that they would come to see how the manor
was faring, and as soon as he felt able to make the journey from his little estate near Cadbury, a short distance south of
Tiverton, they had arranged their affairs, leaving Edgar in charge.

Edgar had been his most loyal servant for more years than either cared to remember. They had met in the hellhole of Acre in
1291, both arriving in time to witness the city’s death at the hands of many thousands of Moors. They had set up a vast siege
encampment all about the city walls, and during their time there, Baldwin had found Edgar and saved his life. Subsequently,
both had been injured and would have died, had it not been for the generosity of the
Poor Fellow Soldiers of Christ and the Temple of Solomon, the Knights Templar, who had rescued them. As a result, as soon
as they could, both had given their oaths to serve the Order, and Baldwin became a knight while Edgar became his sergeant.
They served together for many years, until the appalling day when the Order was arrested.

Friday 13th October 1307. It was a date that felt as though it had been engraved with a red-hot burin on Baldwin’s heart.
Each year he felt drawn to toast his comrades on that day, and yet he could not. The idea that he should celebrate their destruction
was repellent. No, it was better that he remembered them all on days like today, when the sun was newly risen with the promise
of clear weather, like so many of those other days when he and his companions had woken with the dawn.

He held his sword out forwards, his arm straight, elbow and wrist locked, the peacock-blue steel of the blade sitting still
in his grip, and he smiled to himself grimly. There were few knights who were as old as he and yet still capable of holding
their swords outstretched for any period. He was more than fifty years old now, and although he knew that he could best most
men half his age, he had to pick his moments and his opponents.

Yet if there was one thing that the Templars had taught him, it was the benefit of constant practice. A man who trained was
a man who could rely on his reflexes, and now Baldwin swung the sword in his wrist, first letting the point drop down then
spinning it up on his right, then dropping it and flicking it up on the left of his forearm to form a figure 8. After twenty
of those, he threw the sword spinning into the air, and caught it with his left hand, repeating the exercise before tossing
it up again and catching it in his right hand once more.

Now he started the serious training. This was basic work, but he had performed these actions almost every morning since his
acceptance into his Order. It was only at times of great pain that he had neglected his training, such as late last year,
1323, when the crossbow bolt had laid him low for so long.

He could consider the near-death with equanimity now, although at the time he had been appalled that he could die and leave
his wife and daughter without a protector. True, Edgar would be there, and knowing Edgar he would continue to offer his support
and what security he could to Baldwin’s widow and offspring, but it wasn’t the same.

It was a dreadful thought, that his wife should be widowed and left to fend for herself. Of all his nightmares, that was the
one which recurred most often and left him distraught, unrefreshed and emotionally drained in the morning.

Jeanne de Liddinstone, as she had been before marrying Baldwin, had been born to a moderately wealthy family, but when they
had been murdered she had left to live with family in Bordeaux, only returning when she married Ralph de Liddinstone.

Sadly Ralph proved to be a brute. He took to abusing his wife when she couldn’t produce a child for him, and accused her of
barrenness. Shortly before Baldwin first met her, Ralph died. A little while later, Baldwin married Jeanne. Now they had a
daughter, Richalda.

He lifted the point of the blade so that the tip was in line with his arm, the point up-slanting, and then swivelled his body
right, blocking an imaginary hack; with a flick of his wrist he moved the blade to point out to his right, and brought his
fist across, the blade trailing, covering a thrust at his head. The sword’s point fell and he covered a series of
attacks at his legs, always a vulnerable target, especially in this age of staffs and polearms, then began a series of defensive
manoeuvres, first to cover his right flank, then his left. At the end of this, he was panting, and there was a fine sheen
of sweat over his features, as well as what felt like a small snake of ice on his spine where the perspiration had soaked
into his shirt.

The only parts of his body that felt hot were his forearms and his wound.

His breast was so damp, he pulled his shirt away suspiciously and stared down to where the foul, swollen pock mark stood so
plainly, thinking for a moment that the damned thing was leaking once more. For the last two months it had seemed fairly well
on the way to healing, but before Christmas every time he exercised it had wept a watery, unpleasant liquor, and even some
little while after Candlemas it had bled just a little. It was enough to make a man concern himself over his health. Especially
now that he had something to lose, Baldwin told himself.

The sun was quite high in the sky now, and Baldwin stood staring ahead. The hills of Dartmoor were licked with a bright orange-pink
glow where the sun hit them, while the parts the sun could not reach were blue-grey, with small flecks of what looked like
whiteness to show where the frost still lay thickly on the grasses. It was a perfect, marvellous sight to Baldwin, who had
spent so many years abroad in hot countries which had no frost to stimulate them.

‘My husband? Are you training again?’

Baldwin narrowed his eyes and winced without turning at once. When he faced his wife, it was with an expression of bright
cheerfulness. ‘My love! I had thought to leave you resting. I didn’t intend to wake you. I am sorry.’

‘Husband, do you mean you’ve only just risen?’ she asked.

‘Of course,’ he said with apparent surprise.

‘Then you haven’t been out here long enough to work up a sweat?’

He recoiled from the questing hand that snaked towards his back, growling. ‘Woman, please leave my person. Treat an invalid
with a little respect.’

‘So much of an invalid that you can stand out here in the frost and the freezing air?’

‘I was looking at the view,’ he protested.

‘With your sword in your hand,’ she said with innocent deliberation.

‘May I not keep anything secret from your suspicious mind?’

‘Husband,’ she said sweetly, ‘do I hound you for all your secrets? I have no need. You give them up so easily and unintentionally.’

He scowled at her. It was impossible to be angry with her. Jeanne was perfection in his eyes, her round face framed by thick,
red-gold tresses, blue eyes like cornflowers on a summer’s afternoon, a small, almost tip-tilted nose, a wide mouth with an
over-full upper lip which gave her a stubborn look – all in all, he had never seen any woman more beautiful. He growled, ‘It
is hardly comely for a wife to be so forthright.’

‘It is hardly sensible for a wounded man to be testing his scars in the cold like this, especially after sleeping so badly.’

He looked away guiltily. ‘It was nothing. I was thirsty.’

‘In the middle of the night, and you were forced to leave our bed and fetch water? And couldn’t return?’

‘I was not tired once I rose, Jeanne,’ he said, and then
sighed. He picked up the scabbard again, thrust the sword home, and faced her. ‘You are right, though. It is this shoulder
of mine. The thing hurts whenever I lie still with it, and there seems to be nothing I can do to alleviate it.’

‘You should rest it then, husband. Stop this foolish sword-waving in the early morning. Take things more easily; rest more.’

Baldwin nodded. ‘Perhaps you are right.’

‘Do not patronise me, Baldwin,’ she said tartly. ‘I won’t have it.’

‘I am sorry, then.’

‘You are still convinced that there will be war?’

Baldwin shot her a look. They had set off on the way back to the house, and her tone was light, but there was an edge to it.
‘Yes.’

‘I am happy here now,’ she said quietly. ‘I was not when Ralph was alive. He was so different when he realised that we wouldn’t
have children. It made him bitter … bitter and cruel. You have changed my life for me. There are two men who have been
consistently kind to me since I married Ralph: the Abbot of Tavistock, and you. I couldn’t bear to lose you, Baldwin. You
do realise that, don’t you?’

‘What brought this on?’ he asked with some confusion. ‘You will not lose me.’

‘If there is a war, I may have to. You may be forced to ride to battle and leave me behind,’ she said quietly. ‘And when you
ride away, you will go to find excitement. I don’t begrudge you that, but you won’t be thinking of me, will you? Nor of Richalda.
You will be thinking of warfare and how to win renown by your prowess. Yet all the time I shall be here ready to mourn my
loss … well, in truth, I will already be in mourning, because although I shall hope and
pray that you will come home, it is possible that I shall never see you again, and that is a very hard thought to accept.’

‘Jeanne, I swear to you that Richalda and you will never be far from my mind if it comes to war.’ Seeing the doubt in her
eyes, he took up his sword, and kissed the cross. ‘I swear it, Jeanne! I practise here because I want to ensure that even
if there is a war, I am fit enough and experienced enough to return to my home. I do not wish to die because of a moment’s
thoughtlessness. My training is perhaps all that can save me in a battle.’ He looked behind them, back at the moors. When
he spoke again, it was in a reflective tone, more gentle. ‘You say that I ride for honour and excitement … well, it is
possible that I could find myself honoured, but it is more likely that I would find myself dead. I have seen war. More men
always die through starvation and pestilence than wounds won honourably on the field of battle. I fear that more than anything:
a slow, lingering death at the roadside after the host has moved on, alone, without the opportunity to say farewell to you.
If I go to war, Jeanne, my thoughts will be with you always …’

Jeanne was about to speak when there came an enraged bellow from the house. Jeanne closed her eyes and sighed, and Baldwin
cast his eyes heavenwards. ‘Is there no possibility of sending her home, Jeanne? Or anywhere else?’

Friar John set his jaw as he made his way rather laboriously up the lane towards the church. He had found a temporary place
of refuge last night, a charcoal burner’s hut in a coppice west of Iddesleigh, but after the foul discovery at the small holding
he thought it might be better to move farther away as soon as he could. Friars were not usually so detested by
the populace that they would be attacked, but a prudent man knew when to conceal himself, and a fellow who walked about after
nightfall when there were plainly dangerous rogues abroad could soon become a target no matter how innocent.

There were two places on which John had counted in his life: churches and inns. In neither establishment was there anything
for him to fear. Today, simply because the church was the nearer of the two, he entered that first, listening with a smile
of gratitude to the creaking of the door hinges. To him, unoiled hinges had a sound all their own: the sound of comfort, holding
the promise of warmth and dryness. There was a stoup of holy water by the door, and he dipped his fingers in it, closing his
eyes and crossing himself fervently.

At times he’d been accused of play-acting. People said that a man who seemed so committed must by nature be more of a charlatan
than a genuine man of God, but to that he answered that all must explain themselves before God when the time came. For his
part, his conscience was clear. He had devoted his life to God and the spreading of His Gospel, and if men wished to mock,
that was for them.