Journey in Time (Knights in Time) (20 page)

***

The advisement wasn’t necessary. Only a fool try’s a king’s patience. Preoccupied with reasons for the king’s request, she rushed through her morning routine, dressing in the first gown Enid pulled from the trunk.

 
“Will there be anything else, milady?” the maid asked as she finished tying the gown’s laces.

“No, you may go.”

Shakira stepped out of the chamber and was met by the surly servant who acted as her escort. He turned down a cold, dim passageway that intersected with the main corridor. The pathway ran perpendicular to the one she and Alex used the prior evening. Only the servant's torch lit their way. She thought they changed directions after a couple of minutes, but the bend, if it existed, was subtle.

She couldn't see the floor, or her surroundings, only flashes of stone where the servant's torchlight touched. Even his shadow was lost to the gloom.

The dark began to prey on her imagination and played tricks with her logic. The void tightened. The walls pressed closer. The air lacked oxygen.

She struggled to function in the vacuum-like atmosphere. Disoriented, she lost her balance and stumbled. She never suffered from claustrophobia and understood in some corner of her mind that her panic was self-induced. She stopped, bent and grasped her knees, and tried to take deep breaths.

"You delay while the king waits," the servant warned.

"Yes, yes, I know. I need a moment." This wasn't the way to the hall. Where was he really taking her? Perhaps Edward didn't await her at all. He had no real reason to speak to her. Perhaps this was a ruse to lure her to some dank dungeon or worse. A place the king put people meant to be forgotten, an oubliette, a hollow where madness or death is the only relief from the agonizing torture of starvation and thirst. She reached out a shaky hand seeking the support of the stone wall as she fought hysteria.

She recoiled as her fingers touched on a patch of damp slime. She straightened and took several slow steps toward the servant who started down the passage again. Faint light from a window appeared ahead and a breeze reeking of fish. It meant they traveled along the Thames side of the palace.

The river air brought thoughts of escape. How many stories up were they? The chamber where she and Alex slept was on the fourth floor. Had this passage taken a downward turn? She couldn't tell. She'd lost her bearings early. If it had angled down, she might be able to make a run for freedom and leap into the river. The desperate idea faded swiftly. She’d never survive. She wasn’t a strong enough swimmer to fight the fast currents, not to mention the heavy clothing she wore dragging her down. In spite of that reality, for a moment, she considered the option. It had to be better than a prolonged and horrible death. The idea faded too. Logically, before she met a watery end, men on cargo boats would retrieve her. They’d turn her over to the king.

She tamped down her growing fears and told herself the meeting was a big nothing. The king intended to chitchat with her and not secretly imprison her. The part of her that hysteria held onto whispered,
what could the king possibly have to chat with you about?
Whatever the king’s purpose, she had to believe Alex would find a way to prevent anything terrible happening to her.

***

 
Taken to a smoky, windowless antechamber, the servant told her to wait, the king was busy. Good. Her eyes burned and watered from the haze the fireplace generated but she’d be ecstatic to wait all day. Maybe Edward would forget about her.

When the abbey bells tolled eight o’clock, the same servant returned and led her to the well lit council chamber. It was a sea of wood: a floor of oak planks, walls of floor to ceiling mahogany panels interspersed with gilded rosettes, and a tray ceiling of various inlaid woods. If she hadn’t seen the room and someone described it to her, she’d have thought it tedious. She actually found it on the pretty side.

“You may approach, Lady Shakira,” the king said.

On a raised wooden platform, the creator of the Order of the Garter, the Victor of Crecy, and fingers-crossed not the Tormentor of Shakira, sat in a high-backed chair. A fox carved in beautiful detail and painted red decorated the top of the frame. The creature looked just like the one on the Fox and Hounds pub sign near her house.

“Your Highness.” Her curtsy brought her eye level with the upholstered arms of the chair. The hand rests were carved like animal paws, claws extended. An interesting feature if the piece was in a museum and not where it was at the moment.

"Rise," Edward replied.

At dinner, she estimated his height to be about six-foot, tall for the time, nothing to gush about. However, when a subject is not a favored courtier and ordered to appear before one's monarch, six-foot looms like seven-foot, even when seated.

Tense and anxious, she clasped her trembling hands in front of her.

Another man stood near the king, mute and arrow straight. He could be a councilor or a servant, she'd no idea. A third man stepped from a darkened alcove and stopped parallel to her, facing the king. His close presence cut off the fresh air on that side. A heavy dose of lavender drifted over but with an underlying musty scent of clothes not completely clean.

“Thomas Dankworth, milady,” the king said and inclined his head toward the man next to her. "Thomas, may I present my ward, Lady Shakira."
 

My ward.
Her stomach lurched and a horrible sense of foreboding filled her. Denial exploded in her brain, nearly burst from her lips as a sick, dark image of what was about to occur formed.
No. Please, no.
The silent, terrified scream reverberated between her ears.

The king smiled in an impassive, humorless way. "It is our wish for you to spend the next few days at Thomas’s home."

Dankworth offered his hand palm up.

She stared. Her eyes darted from his face to his hand and back, not fully making the connection she was expected to offer her hand to him. Dankworth waited to execute a chivalrous greeting. His hand hung in the air prepared to take hers in his. When the penny did drop, she held out a white knuckled, clenched fist instead. Cool fingers clamped around her knuckles.

“Lady Shakira,” he said and bowed.

Waxy yellow, his skin had an unhealthy tint but was unmarred by the pox scars that ravaged the faces of many courtiers. Neither ugly nor handsome, he attempted in a contrived way to be more attractive. The effect, however, was smarmy and affectated. He stood about two inches taller than her with reddish-brown hair, curled pageboy style at the weak jaw line. From the sheen and strong woody scent, he used musk oil on his meticulous goatee and mustache. Instead of appearing debonair, which she assumed was the intent; the combination drew attention to his pencil thin lips and broad nose.

Dankworth’s flamboyant clothes brought organ grinder’s monkey costumes to mind. Forest green with an elaborate branch pattern embroidered on the hem, his cloak was on the feminine side but not bad. Shakira zeroed in on the gaudy gem brooch he used to fasten the cloak to the garment beneath. Her granny, who favored ostentatious jewelry, would’ve consigned the purple, red, and blue brooch to the white elephant bin in a blink.

Under the cloak he wore a fitted, thigh-length, cote-hardi of apple green velvet with a gold colored hip belt. Its tight sleeves were embellished with a row of gold buttons and extended past his wrists. Alex wore a plain, quilted black one the night before. He hated them.
They’re hot, uncomfortable, and silly looking.

Her mind flashed to the guys in her band. What a mockery they'd make of his frou-frou ensemble. The brief respite mentally laughing at Dankworth faded and the fear returned.
 

She needed to stay focused and look for a way to get a message to Alex. Maybe the maid could be trusted to tell him where she was, or maybe not. More than likely, she'd run to the king with any message left in her possession.
    

Edward continued rattling off Thomas’s pedigree. "He is the queen's favorite wool merchant. I am sure you will find him an amusing and worthy gentleman to help pass the hours while Sir Guy is busy with duties here."

Busy with duties or Blanche Holland? Shakira wondered bitterly.

 
The king raised two fingers and the quiet statue man moved from his place and poured three goblets of wine.

"Your Highness, I am, of course, very pleased you would concern yourself with the routine of a lowly subject such as me," she said. Be submissive and humble, don't offend either man. Her mind worked away, spinning like a crazed, whirling Dervish. "However, it is my belief Sir Guy would not approve of me being in the company of another man, alone."

The excuse was a shot in the dark at best. To all and sundry, she was the Baron Guiscard's foreign mistress, a glorified hooker of limited means and a more limited future.

"Do you defy us with this challenge milady?"

She hadn’t anticipated such a strong negative response and chose her words with great care. "No, Your Highness. I’d never presume to question your decisions. But, I am curious as to how I might advise Sir Guy of my whereabouts."

"He is aware you will be with Thomas for awhile."

Her world spun out of control. ‘Aware?’ ‘He’s aware?’ ‘Be with Thomas awhile?’

"Did you say he knows I am to accompany Milord Dankworth?" The king nodded. "When was he told?"

"He has known since you first arrived."

The king lied. No way he knew
.
Her heart in her throat, she struggled to keep panic at bay. Royal minions could make up any story they wanted about her disappearance. She had little faith Alex would be told the truth. At least, not until the king got the results he wanted, at this point, she wasn't sure what his goal was. Did the king want her dispensed with forever so he could order a marriage between Alex and Blanche? He didn't have to send her away to accomplish such an arrangement, but it would be more convenient. Or, was he truly trying to find a compromise and hoped she and Thomas would hit it off?

It didn’t make any difference if they lied to Alex, he’d have no idea where to look for her. If she escaped, where would she go? The castle wasn’t safe.

Enid entered with the chest that held Shakira’s clothes.

"For your journey," the king said, indicating the chest.

"Milady, are you all right?"

"Hmmm?" Dankworth’s solicitous voice penetrated her thoughts. "Yes. Yes," she mumbled. She had to find a reason to return to their chamber and write Alex a note. "Your Highness, I have the need to take care of..." she made her tone as self-conscious as possible, "a personal feminine matter in the privacy of my chamber."

The king gestured with two fingers and the statue man stepped forward again. "Manfred will show you to the garderobe." He nodded to the maid, "You will attend to any needs Lady Shakira has."

Shit.

Shakira heart sank. They’d give her no chance to leave word for Alex. If that wasn’t bad enough, she'd have to feign being busy in some hideous garderobe. She'd avoided using them. So far, every time nature called she held it or hurried back to their chamber. Now, she'd have to endure one of the filthy, medieval toilets with her long skirts dragging through God only knew what. She gathered the hem of her dress up and followed Manfred to the end of the corridor.

“Ugh.” The noxious smell nearly knocked her over as she stepped inside the well used privy. “My life has become one giant garderobe,” she lamented.

Chapter Twenty-Five