E. M. Powell (18 page)

To find Mama. After all this time. “Do you know where it is?” The feeble question masked the huge longing, painful as deep hunger, that surged within her.

“No. But I’ll find out.” He craned his neck over the crowds. “First, we need a horse.”

♦ ♦ ♦

Sir Reginald Fitzurse listened to the thumps and clatters from the furrier’s home above the shop and sighed in frustration. “How much longer is she going to be?” he asked de Tracy.

De Tracy shrugged in return. “I say we set off after them. I don’t think the woman’s much use to us after what’s happened.” He nodded to the furrier lying dead on the floor.

“Quite.” Fitzurse eyed the corpse with deep irritation. If the old fool’s heart hadn’t given out, he would have been a far better source of information about the girl and Palmer.

“You want him moved?” asked le Bret.

Fitzurse looked at the huge knight, shoulders hunched to ensure he didn’t bump his head on the shop’s low beams. “No. We haven’t time.”

Rapid footsteps came from the stairwell, and the old man’s wife appeared, her sharp face set rigid with shock but not dampened with tears. Averting her gaze, she stepped around her husband’s body and addressed Fitzurse. “I have been through Gilbert’s things. What’s missing is a pair of dark red hose and a blue doublet, a brown woolen cloak and a dark hat. You already know what the young woman wears.” She swallowed hard and drew herself to her fullest height. “Now, I realize I haven’t delivered them to you, but I have given you vital information. If it pleases your lordship, what’s my reward to be?”

“Reward? Who in creation do you think you are?” De Tracy’s bellow in such confined quarters buffeted Fitzurse’s ears.

To her credit, the woman didn’t flinch but kept her gaze on him. “My reward?”

He saw a repeat of the look she had given him in the market, the look that suggested she was a kindred spirit, that they shared common goals in life.

How wrong she was. “Your reward is that you are free to flee with your life when the guards burn this place to the ground.”

“You can’t.” A whisper of defiance, but still no tears. “It’s all I have now.”

Fitzurse clicked his fingers to le Bret. “Tell the guards to act immediately. De Tracy, come. We have work to do.”

The woman fled over to the shuttered window and pulled out a bag of coins from a shelf beneath. Her hands shook with haste as she went to attach it to her belt.

“Mistress?”

She looked up.

“I’ll thank you for that,” he said. “I can make good use of it.”

She passed it to him, a low moan of despair escaping her lips as he took it from her.

He threw the bag to de Tracy, who caught it in a deft movement. “Share it out amongst the guards. My thanks for ensuring the traitorous furrier’s entire property will be naught but ashes.” He gave the woman a final glance as he left. Ah, now the tears came. Good.

CHAPTER 12

The sun lowered in the sky in a red fireball over one side of the town square’s tall roofs. Dark clouds gathered around it and fueled a biting wind.

Theodosia shivered in the strong breeze and pulled Gwen’s yellow shawl tighter around her, scanning the crowds for any sign of the knights. A short way off to her left, Benedict stood at the entrance to a dark, narrow alleyway in intense discussion with an odd-looking man. The knight had ordered her to stay here, with a curtness that allowed no argument.

The man was older than Benedict, and well dressed. But he had a difference about him that seemed familiar. His pale skin, his heavy features. A reddish beard. Something passed between them, then the man turned and disappeared back down the alley.

Benedict gestured for her to join him as he set off at a pace for the other side of the square.

“What have you been doing?” she asked.

A scream pierced the noise surrounding them.

She clutched at Benedict’s arm.

“Fire! Fire!”

The scream was taken up with shouts, roars, a surge of people moving toward the shouts as still others ran from it.

“I’ll wager it’s Gilbert’s, it’s over that way.” Benedict pulled her along. “But thank the Almighty for the distraction.”

She clung to him in the confused mass of yelling, shouting people as the smell of smoke floated on the breeze.

“Fitzurse?” she whispered.

Benedict nodded, shielding her in his steady hold.

“Make way!”

The crowd pressed back as a small cart rumbled past, pulled by two men and loaded with water-filled barrels. People fell in behind it as it raced along, headed for the source of the spectacle.

Benedict led the way to where a fenced-off area held a group of horses, the animals shifting nervously, eyes rolling at the commotion and smell of burning.

“Benedict. You have not answered me about that stranger you spoke to.”

He paid no heed. “Fellow,” Benedict called to one of the men who watched them.

The man came over.

“I’ve my eye on that gelding,” said Benedict.

The man nodded and went to fetch the horse.

She tugged at his sleeve. “We have no money for a horse. Please do not tell me you are going to steal one.”

He shook his head and reached beneath his cloak. “We’ve got money.” He pulled out a small leather bag and selected a few coins. “I’ll sort the animal,” he said quickly. “You go and buy food for our journey.”

She stared at the money in her hand. Of course. The man. Why he seemed familiar. The pictures in her manuscripts. She glared at Benedict. “That man. He was a Jew, was he not? You have borrowed from a moneylender.”

“If you say so.” Benedict gave an impatient pat to her shoulder as the horse trader brought the animal before him. “Now, be quick. Food, all right? It’s a simple task. Just get it done.”

Containment.
Theodosia bit down a reply at this fresh order as he turned to the horse trader. She walked rapidly back to where she’d seen food stalls. The coins she held might as well be burning through her palm, hot with the sin of usury. A sin that did not appear to bother the knight a whit.

Stallholders were closing up with haste, keen to leave with the threat of fire. The smell of smoke came stronger now, and men and boys rushed to and fro with leather buckets.

Her eye lit upon a barrow where two squat women packed away a selection of raw meat. Would that do? She looked back to where Benedict and the horse trader had an arm each on the animal’s side, deep in studied argument.

Obviously far more important than her simple task. Jaw set in irritation, she approached the women. Food was food. He could figure out how to cook it, and unless she hurried, they’d have nothing.

“Afraid we’re closed, mistress,” said one, with a kick out at a thin dog skulking at her skirts. “We have to be off.”

Her friend nodded, hurling gobbets into a wooden pail.

“Could I not have what’s left, then you wouldn’t have to pack it away?” Theodosia held out her coins. “See, I have my money ready.”

The first woman raised her eyebrows to her companion. “Good idea. I’ll even put it in a cloth for you, mistress.” Her swift actions matched her words. “Cockscombs, sheep’s lights.” She tossed in a frightful jellied lump. “Lovely bit of pig’s liver.”

Theodosia kept her expression polite. It all appeared a gristly, blood-soaked mess to her. The smell of it was none too fresh either, and her stomach rebelled. She nodded at her money on her open palm. “Will this be enough?”

“That’ll cover it.” The woman scooped the coins into her own hand and shoved the bundle at Theodosia. “I’m afraid we’re closed now. We have to be off.”

Her friend’s smirk told Theodosia of her own naiveté.

Theodosia went to object, but the woman started to push her loaded barrow away. “I wouldn’t hang around if I were you, mistress. This whole place could go up.”

Seething at their dishonesty, Theodosia started to make her way back toward Benedict. She could hardly make a fuss. What’s more, neither could he. His money was tainted, so serve him right. She stepped aside to let yet another cart hasten past with more water.

A couple of streets away, the flames now licked high enough to show in the sky. Gathered outside the inns were their large numbers of customers, as people had run outside to point and exclaim at the sight. She saw the knight shake hands with the horse dealer and increased her pace, squeezing past three portly male pilgrims. “I beg your pardon, good sirs.”

They looked at her, eyes flicking over her.

“No need to beg anything, chicken,” said one, a leer on his fat face and a full jug of ale in one hand. “D’you need aught? You look a bit lost.”

Her mouth tightened in disapproval. Holy men should not behave so. She went to move on.
Wait.
They might know. If Polesworth Abbey was a holy place, they may well have been there.

“As a matter a fact, I do,” she said. “I have an enquiry from my husband.” She emphasized the word and indicated to Benedict. The men followed her point. Benedict would stand head and shoulders over them.

Backs straightening, they became instantly polite.

“We have heard of a place called Polesworth Abbey,” she said. “Have you been there on your blessed travels?”

One man preened. “’Course we have, mistress. It’s near Warwick. A very holy place.”

An innkeeper came to the door. “Sirs! Your meal is ready.”

They tipped their hats with a cautious look at a glowering Benedict.

Theodosia went back to him as he adjusted the stirrups on their newly purchased mount.

“I told you to hurry,” he said. “We need food, not idle gossip.”

“I did not waste my time in gossip. I used my wits to get the information we needed.” She thrust the bundle of raw meat at him with a triumphant look. “Here’s your precious food. But I’ve also found out where Polesworth is.”

Benedict did not share her triumph, casting around the crowd instead with an uneasy air. “In future, ask me before you use your wits. Do you hear me?”

A great shout of many voices rose up, followed by a heavy crash that shuddered through the cobbles beneath them.

“Let’s be off. Every minute here is a minute we could be seen.” He boosted her up into the saddle before she could reply.

♦ ♦ ♦

The first tiny snowflakes stung like sand as the strengthening wind flung them into Theodosia’s face. She rode atop the heavy-boned bay gelding, Benedict behind her in control of the reins. Astride a horse once more, she found her body moved in time with the animal, her muscles knowing how to balance in its rhythm.

The night sky had no moon, and the weak starlight was banished by the arrival of the snow clouds.
Oh, the cold, the cold.
She buried her cheeks in her shawl and tried to contain her teeth’s relentless chatter. She and Benedict had ridden across barren open scrubland for the last couple of hours, and the stiff breeze had found its way into every gap and opening of her clothing. Now the snow brought with it a new level of discomfort.

Frigid too was the atmosphere between them. They’d not spoken except for a terse exchange in which she relayed where the pilgrims had said Polesworth was.

“You see those?” His voice came as a surprise as he pointed ahead to where the dark outline of trees showed through the sheets of powdery snowflakes. “From here on, there’ll be many miles of dense forests.”

“Won’t that slow us down?” she said, her words muffled by her shawl.

“Yes,” came his short reply, “but it should protect us from the worst of the weather.”

“Do not seek protection on my account.”

“I’m not. We have to stop on Quercus’s account. I don’t want to wear the animal out and have him die on us.”

The gelding too had his head lowered against the onslaught of the weather, but he walked on, bearing his heavy load without hesitation.

“Better that than Fitzurse and his knights catch us up.”

“That’s not likely.”

She half turned in the saddle to catch his eye. “Then you admit I did the right thing by talking to those pilgrims?”

“Fools like that, wasting their lives parading around the country, looking for pieces of dead saints to pray to?”

She pushed her advantage home. “Of course you’d see pilgrims as fools. But you haven’t answered me. They knew where Polesworth Abbey was, so I did the right thing.”

“I’d rather you did as you were told. It was a risk. And I suppose it paid off,” he added ungraciously.

“I am glad you acknowledge my quick thinking.”

“More like mine, Sister. The knights are scouring Knaresborough for a chain-mailed knight and an anchoress in cream wool clothing.” He patted their bundle of clothing behind him. “They’ll find neither us nor our clothes, and this noble animal takes us well beyond their reach.”

“Noble except he was bought with tainted money?”

An odd look came across his face. “A gelding like this can eat up the miles.” He began to talk of horses, of distances.

Theodosia faced forward once more. Doubt nipped at her, but she could not voice why. Something was not right with Sir Benedict Palmer. Every time she mentioned the moneylender, he changed the subject, made her busy. Distracted her. What was he up to? She needed to think, to concentrate, to try and figure it out. If he thought she could be easily fooled, he’d be wrong.

♦ ♦ ♦

Fitzurse crossed the cobbled town square of Knaresborough with care, the stones beneath his boots covered in a slick of freshly fallen snow.

“Any sign of them?” said de Tracy.

Fitzurse scanned the homebound crowds, noisy still after the excitement of the fire. “No. We’ll start to ask in there.” He set off for the brightly lit inns. “Le Bret, you stay out here, ask around.”

Le Bret gave a nod of acknowledgment and set about his task.

Fitzurse pushed open the first inn’s door and was met with a wave of warmth that carried with it a loud clamor of voices and the smell of boiled mutton and onions. Long wooden benches and tables were crammed with travelers and pilgrims who supped ale and tucked into bowls of steaming food. He wrinkled his nose in disgust. “They might as well set a big trough down in the middle of this room,” he murmured to de Tracy as a sweating, harassed-looking innkeeper bore down on them, pots of ale in each hand.