Dragon's Lair (2 page)

She'd never worried about incurring Eleanor's animosity before, confident of her own power to beguile, putting too much trust in her blood ties to the queen, distant though they might be. But in this fragrant, trellised garden, she was suddenly and acutely aware of how vulnerable she truly was. It was such a demoralizing realization that she quickly reminded herself how understanding the queen had been about her pregnancy. She'd feared that Eleanor would turn her out, letting all know of her shame. Instead, the queen had offered to help. So why, then, did she feel such unease?

She glanced sideways at the other woman, and then away. She'd often thought the queen had cat eyes, greenish-gold and inscrutable, eyes that seemed able to see into the inner recesses of her soul, to strip away her secrets, one by one. Claudine bit her lip, keeping tier own eyes downcast, for she had so many secrets.

Eleanor was aware of the young woman's edginess, and it afforded her some grim satisfaction. She bore Claudine no grudge for allowing herself to become entangled in John's web; she'd had too many betrayals in her life to be wounded by one so small. And so once she'd discovered Claudine's complicity in her son's scheming, she'd been content to keep that knowledge secret, reasoning that a known spy was a defanged snake. She'd even used the unwitting Claudine to pass on misinformation from time to time. But if she felt no desire for vengeance, neither did she have sympathy for Claudine's predicament. Every pleasure in this world came with a price, be it a dalliance in conspiracy or one in bed.

Glancing about to make sure none of her other attendants were within earshot, Eleanor asked the girl if she was still queasy. When Claudine swallowed and swore that she no longer felt poorly, Eleanor gave her a skeptical scrutiny. "Why, then, is your face the color of newly skimmed milk? There is no need to pre tend with me, child. Only men could call a pregnancy 'easy,' but some are undoubtedly more troublesome than others. For me, it was my last. There were days when even water could unsettle my stomach. I've sailed in some fierce storms, but God's Truth, I was never so greensick as when I was carrying John."

Claudine's eyelashes flickered, no more than that. But she could not keep the blood from rising in her face and throat. Watching as her pallor was submerged in a flood of color, Eleanor smiled slyly. This was new, like an involuntary twitch or a hiccup, this sudden discomfort whenever John's name was mentioned. Not for the first time, Eleanor wondered who had truly fathered Claudine's child. Was it Justin de Quincy as she claimed? Or was it John?

"I think it is time," she said, "for you to withdraw to the nunnery at Godstow."

Claudine nodded reluctantly. This was the plan, with cover stories fabricated for the court and her family back in Aquitaine. She should have gone a fortnight ago, but she'd found excuses to delay, dreading the loneliness and seclusion and boredom of the coming months, "I suppose so," she admitted, sounding so forlorn that Eleanor experienced an involuntary pang of empathy; she knew better than most the onus of confinement. It was true that this confinement was by choice and temporary, but Eleanor could not help identifying with Claudine's aversion to the religious life. There had been times in her past when she'd feared being shut up in some remote, obscure convent for the rest of her days, forgotten by all but her gaolers and God.

"I will speak with Sir Nicholas this eve," she said briskly, determined not to soften toward this foolhardy, unhappy girl. "The arrangements have all been made. It remains only for you to settle in at Godstow."

"Sir Nicholas de Mydden?" Claudine echoed in dismay. "But Justin was to escort me to the nunnery."

"Justin cannot -"

"Madame, he promised me!" Claudine was so flustered that she did not even realize she'd interrupted the queen. Lowering her voice hastily lest they attract attention, she said coaxingly, "Surely you understand why I would prefer Justin's company, Your Grace. I know I can trust him. And... and he wants to accompany me. This child is his, after all."

Eleanor looked into Claudine's flushed, distraught face, striving for patience. "Well, this is one promise Justin cannot keep. He is away from the court, and I know not when he will return. As for Nicholas, he is no gossipmonger." Unable to resist adding, "Those in my service know the value I place upon loyalty."

Claudine's lashes fluttered down again, veiling her eyes. After a moment, she said meekly, "Forgive my boldness, madame. It was hot my intent to argue with you. If you have confidence in Sir Nicholas's discretion, then so do I. But could I not wait till week's end? Mayhap Justin will be back by then."

She took Eleanor's shrug for assent and fell in step beside the queen as they cut across the grassy mead. "I did not even know Justin was gone, for he did not bid me farewell."

She sounded both plaintive and aggrieved, and Eleanor found herself thinking that Justin might be fortunate that he was not considered a suitable husband for this pampered young kinswoman of hers. It would be no easy task, keeping Claudine de Loudun content.

"Madame... it is not my intent to pry," Claudine said, with such pious prevarication that Eleanor rolled her eyes skyward. "Whatever Justin's mission for you may be, it is not for me to question it. I would ask this, though. Can you at least tell me if he is in any danger?"

Eleanor paused, considering. Her first impulse was to give the girl the reassurance she sought. But the truth was that whenever her son John was involved, there was bound to be danger.

~*~

It was a spare turnout for a hanging. Usually the citizens of Winchester thronged to the gallows out on Andover Road, eager to watch as a felon paid the ultimate price for his earthly sins. Luke de Marston, the under-sheriff of Hampshire, could remember hangings that rivaled the St Giles Fair, with venders hawking meat pies and children getting underfoot and cutpurses on the prowl for unwary victims. But the doomed soul being dragged from the cart was too small a fish to attract a large crowd, a criminal by happenstance rather than choice.

The few men and women who'd bothered to show up were further disappointed by the demeanor of the culprit. They expected bravado and defiance from their villains, or at the very least, stoical self-control. But this prisoner was obviously terrified, whimpering and trembling so violently that he had to be assisted up the gallows steps. People were beginning to turn away in disgust even before the rope was tightened around his neck.

Luke's deputy shared their dissatisfaction, for he believed that a condemned man owed his audience a better show than this, "Pitiful," he said, shaking his head in disapproval. "Remember how the Fleming died, cursing God with his last breath?"

Luke remembered. Gilbert the Fleming had been one of Winchester's most notorious outlaws, as brutal as he was elusive, evading capture again and again until he'd been brought down by Luke and the queen's man, Justin de Quincy. His hanging had been a holiday.

"Luke."

The voice was familiar, but it should have been seventy-two miles away in London. Spinning around to face de Quincy, Luke scowled, for the younger man's sudden materialization was unsettling, coming as it did just as he'd been thinking of him. "Sometimes, de Quincy, I think you do it on purpose."

Justin was not put off by Luke's brusque welcome. While they'd started out as adversaries, they'd soon become allies, united in their common desire to ensnare Gilbert the Fleming. "Do what?"

"Appear like this in a puff of blue smoke and scare the daylights out of me. If I did not know better, I'd suspect you were a warlock instead of a harbinger of evil tidings."

Justin couldn't argue with that; he and Luke shared a past marked by murder, mayhem, and treason. "I'm here," he said, "to invite you to join a hunt."

Luke regarded him warily. "And just what are we hunting this time?"

"Our usual quarry," Justin admitted, "the one we track by following the scent of brimstone."

~*~

The port of Southampton lay just twelve miles to the south of Winchester, and it was still daylight when Luke and Justin reined in at the Bargate, a square stone tower that guarded the northern entrance into the city.

"Do you not think it is time," Luke declared abruptly, "that you were more forthcoming? Suppose you do find John here. What then? We cannot very well arrest him by ourselves, and I do not fancy arresting him at all, not when the man might well be king one day. This seems a long way to come merely to verify a rumor, de Quincy. I'd wager you have something else in mind, and naturally you are loath to share it with me. I've known Anchorite hermits that were more talkative than you. You need not confide every last detail of your battle plan, but I want more than you've so far given me,"

Justin knew Luke would not be mollified with less than the truth, or at least a goodly portion of it. "I've not misled you," he insisted. "The queen wants me to confirm that John is in Southampton, making ready to sail for France. But you are right, and there is more to it than that. The queen has a spy in John's service. This may be the last chance he has to convey any messages to the queen, and since I am the only one who knows of his mission, I am also the only one who can seek him out ere they sail."

Luke was not about to ask for a name. He knew Justin would not tell him. Nor did he truly want to know; he'd learned long ago that Scriptures was right and "He that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow," at least when the knowledge was as dangerous as the identity of the queen's spy in her son's household. Instead, he concentrated upon the logistics of Justin's mission, suggesting that they search the docks first, find out which ships were preparing for the Channel crossing. That made sense to Justin and they split up soon after they'd passed through the Bargate, Luke heading for the castle quay and Justin continuing down English Street.

Turning onto the Fleshambles, where the city butchers had their shops, Justin was dismayed to see so many people still out and about. He reminded himself, though, that John was not a man to pass unnoticed. The streets were narrow, crowded with passersby, and Justin had to keep ducking his head to avoid sagging ale-poles and the overhang of buildings extending out into the roadway. When he saw a smithy close by the fishmongers' market, he hastily dismounted and soon struck a bargain with the blacksmith: a few coins in exchange for a stall for his stallion in the farrier's stable.

He decided to search the docks next and turned into the first alley that led toward the river. It was not much wider than that length of his sword, and he had to squeeze past a couple who' ducked into the alley for a quick sexual encounter. The man was too preoccupied to notice Justin, grunting and thrusting with such force that the woman's body was being slammed against the wall; she made no protest, gazing over her partner's shoulder at Justin with indifferent, empty eyes. She was so young, though - barely old enough to have started her flux - that Justin felt a flicker pity as he detoured around them. Luke would have called him a softhearted dolt - and often did - but Justin had a foundling's instinctive sympathy for the downtrodden, God's poor, the lost, the doomed, and the abandoned. He saw no harm in offering up a brief prayer for the soul of this child-woman selling her body in Southampton alley.

As he emerged from the alley, Justin came upon a lively waterfront scene. There were a few ships moored at the quays, but the larger vessels were anchored out in the harbor. Several small lighters were shuttling back and forth between these ships and the docks, where sailors and passengers mingled with vendors and merchants come to supervise the unloading of their cargo. Although Vespers had sounded more than an hour ago, the crew of a French cog was still hard at work, using a block and tackle to transfer wine tuns into a waiting lighter. The casks were heavy and unwieldy and one was balanced so precariously that Justin would normally have lingered to watch. But now he gave it only a glance, for his attention had been drawn to a cluster of well-dressed men gathered on the West Quay.

Stepping back into the mouth of the alley so he could observe without being seen, Justin had no difficulty in picking out the queen's son. The highborn were always magnets for every eye, even in these dubious circumstances, and John was surrounded by the curious, the hopeful, and the hungry. Peddlers cried out their wares, ships' masters jockeyed for position as they offered the hire of their vessels, and beggars huddled in the outermost ring of the circle, being kept at a distance by hard-faced men in chain mail. Justin found himself wondering what it would be like to live his life on center stage, like an actor in one of the Christmas plays. John would never be a supporting player; for him, it must be the lead role or nothing.

John started toward the alley and Justin withdrew farther into it. The first part of his mission had been easy enough to accomplish. But Durand de Curzon was as slippery as a conger eel and not even a forked stick would be enough to pin him down. Justin still remembered his shock upon his discovery that Durand was not John's "tame wolf," bur Eleanor's. He had never loathed any one as much as he did Durand, and it vexed him no end to have to give the other man even a sliver of respect. He could not deny Durand's courage, though, for if John ever discovered his betrayal, death would come as a mercy.

Justin was so intent upon his surveillance that he was slow to heed the muffled sounds behind him. He did not swing around until he heard a choked-off scream. At the end of the alley, the young prostitute was struggling to get away from her customer. She kicked him in the shin and almost broke free, but he caught the skirt of her gown, and when she stumbled, he shoved her back against the wall. Justin took one step toward them before halting. His first instinct was to come to the girl's aid, but if he did, he risked alerting John to his presence. This was none of his concern, after all. Whores were used to being slapped around.

But then the man backhanded her across the face and grabbed her throat. Justin spared a second for a regretful glance over his before lunging forward. He had no interest in fighting fair, only in fighting fast, and made use of a maneuver he'd learned from a battle-scarred serjeant named Jonas, seizing a handful of the man's long, scraggly hair and bringing his fist down hard on the back of his neck. It proved as effective in Southampton alleys as it had in London's mean streets; the man staggered, then sank to his knees, mouth ajar, eyes dazed and unfocused. Snatching up a broken piece of wood, the girl swung it wildly at her assailant. When it missed, she threw it aside and began to scream curses and abuse at him, revealing an impressive command of profanity for one so young.