Kathryn Le Veque (19 page)

Alisanne’s eyes widened. “Purification?” she repeated. “What does
that mean?”
    
Albert didn’t have the heart to tell
her if she didn’t already know.
 
He
didn’t want to frighten her more than she already was.

“It is a manner of being put to death,” he said simply before
turning to Ovier. “You should both be ready and in position by sunrise, for
that is when we will be bringing Roane out of his cell. Do not delay.”

Ovier nodded, as did Alisanne.
 
Albert grabbed a piece of bread from his uncle’s table, bread as hard as
stone, and chomped it down as he pulled his gauntlets back on.
 
Without another word, he quit the hut,
leaving Alisanne and Ovier in the sudden and brittle silence.
 
The weight of the approaching situation was not
lost on either of them, although Ovier was much more in control about it than
Alisanne was.
 
As she stood there looking
as if she had just seen a ghost, Ovier began to move.

“Come along, lady,” he said briskly. “We must collect what we can
to disguise the men in.
 
I believe I have
enough here to adequately conceal them but you must help me inventory it.
 
Come along, now.”

Alisanne began to move purely because he told her to, but her
thoughts were running wild. “What are you going to do to create a diversion?”
she wanted to know.
 
“Albert said you
should create a stampede!”

Ovier grinned as he moved about. “Albert wants me to create chaos,
and chaos I shall,” he said. “One does not need to create a stampede in order
to do that.”

“Then what will you do?”

Ovier began to pull pieces of material from a wadded pile under
his cot. “Many years ago, when I was a young knight, I went on the second
crusade to The Levant with King Louis of France.
 
Oh, my lady, I was fascinated by everything I
saw in my travels! The Levant is a land of great mystery and wonderment.
 
It was during that time that I realized I was
more interested in the mystic arts than in warring. Warring was simply a way to
kill men and conquer countries; the mystic arts held the secret to Life
itself.”

Alisanne cocked her head.
“Mystic arts?”

Ovier nodded as he pulled out more garments. “How do you think I
learned to put fresh milk into your eyes?” he said. “The physics of The Levant
know much more than we poor Christians do about healing.
 
In the wilds outside of Jerusalem, I found a
man who lived very much alone but who knew many wonderful and miraculous
things. We became friends and I learned how to create pastes to draw out
poisons, and how the body works against certain medicaments.
 
But I also learned other things, like how to
create fire that will burn even when water is poured upon it.”

Alisanne’s eyes widened with curiosity. “Truly?” she said, awed.
“What manner of fire is this?”

Ovier finished tossing cloaks at her and stood up, stiffly, and
made his way back over to his cluttered table. “Ingredients that the Arabs knew
of but that the English are limited in,” he said as he began to fumble around.
“My mentor, Asharif the Good, taught me to make burning lime and
saltpetier
from wood ash.
 
When mixed with bitumen, it can create a fire
that will not be extinguished with water. It will burn anywhere.
 
It is my intention to create a fire to
distract the Hospitallers so that Albert can free your lover.”

Alisanne was property impressed.
 
She stood a moment, watching Ovier as he began to pull out bowls of
ingredients, carefully filling small gourds with his mysterious mixtures.
 
He seemed so very confident in what he was
doing, which in turn fed
her own
confidence.
 
With such great minds working to help Roane,
surely there could be nothing less than success.
 
She felt extremely grateful.

Still, she had her own work to do and she forced herself to continue
with her tasks of assembling disguises for Roane and Albert and her father.
 
Although fear continued to nip at her, she was
determined and resolute; she had a job to do, something that would help Roane
and her father escape to freedom.
 
She
could not, and would not, collapse like a frightened fool.
 
The lives of the men she loved best depended
upon it.
 
 
But, God, she was so very frightened.
 
She found herself praying steadily as she
worked.

The time was upon them.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

He had died about midnight as far as Roane could tell. Edward de
Soulant, Baron Craven, had succumbed to whatever cough and fever had him in its
grip for several days and just before midnight, his breathing became labored
and weak.
 
Roane had held the man to
comfort him and as midnight struck, the man had breathed his last in Roane’s
arms.

Roane was devastated on Alisanne’s behalf, knowing how much she
had loved her father. She had risked her life to save him once, even at the
expense of luring Roane into a trap. But all of that was behind them now, bits
of memories to join all of the other memories in their minds like stars
blanketing the sky.
 
There were so many
good memories in that starband that they wiped out the early memories of the fear
and distrust and suspicion he’d first had upon meeting Alisanne. Now, Edward
felt like family and he mourned the loss deeply.

Roane had yelled up to the guards when Edward had passed away but
he had been ignored, so as the night progressed and Edward’s body began to
stiffen, he rolled the man into the corner and covered him with damp hay to
show him a small measure of respect.
 
It
simply wouldn’t have been right to let him lie in the middle of the cell, his
body cooling, as if he was no better than an animal.
 
So he put him in a corner and murmured a few
prayers.

The night passed and Roane contemplated what the morning would
bring.
 
He hadn’t seen the sun in days,
weeks even; he had seriously lost track of just how long he had been in the
cell because he had no sense of day and night. He only knew that it was
approaching dawn because he’d heard one of the guards overhead mention what
he’d had for supper that night. Roane’s head hurt constantly and the wound to
his chest had been very slow to heal although, thankfully, it had never grown
rancid.
 
It was mostly healed now but
lack of food and fresh air and adequate comfort had left him exhausted and
weak.
 
Still, knowing that Albert was
ready to help him escape and that Alisanne was well had kept him alive.
 
He would take on the devil himself if he
thought it would help him escape these horrific bowels and into Alisanne’s
arms.

At some point, he must have slept because when next he realized,
someone was lifting the grate on the top of his bottle cell and creating a bit
of a racket.
 
Instantly awake, with his
heart in his throat, he watched as the rope ladder was dropped and armored men
began descending.
 
So the time had come. Still
he sat, waiting, until the fourth man descended and they all stood around,
looking at him as if waiting for him to rise up and throw lightning bolts from
his fingertips.
 
In
fact, when he lifted his hands just the slightest, two of the men jumped in
fear.
 
He fought off a grin as a
big knight with a no-nonsense manner about him broke from the pack.

“Enough with this foolishness.”
It was Albert and he reached
down, grabbing Roane by the arm and hauling him to his feet. “Put your wrists
together, de Garr. No tricks or you shall not like my reaction.”

Roane had to make a show of distaste for Albert lest the others
catch on that he knew the man and was partial to him. With obvious disdain, he
held out his arms as slowly and reluctantly as he possibly could, as if
irritated by the entire undertaking.

“So you come now,” he said, his voice low like thunder. “I’ve been
calling to the guards for hours. My cellmate has died during the night and must
be removed.”

A ripple of shock crossed Albert’s
features that
was
quickly gone.
 
He slapped the
shackles on Roane’s wrists and began to twist the tightening screws.
 
“I am not concerned about a dead animal in
the corner,” he said. “All I am concerned with is you. Will you come peacefully
and with honor, or will we have to bind you and cart you from this place like a
caged beast?”

Roane couldn’t help but notice that the shackles weren’t tight at
all; in fact, he could easily slip his hands from them. “I will come
peacefully,” he said evenly, “but only if you tend to this dead man and give
him a proper burial.”

He could tell that Albert was confused;
is Roane serious? I don’t have time to bury the lady’s father!
“I
will see that he’s tended to,” he said after a moment. “Will you come peacefully
now?”

“I will.”

Albert led Roane to the rope ladder and, rather roughly, shoved
him at it and forced Roane to climb.
 
He
did, surprisingly deftly considering his wrists were shackled, but as he
reached the
top,
more guards grabbed his arms and pulled
him out of the hole. He ended up tripping onto his knees and as he struggled to
get up, a voice he knew very well filled his ears.

“De Garr,” Bordeleaux
said,
a hint of
sinister to his tone. “So the day of reckoning has come for you.”

Considering he’d spent weeks in darkness, even the dim light of
the upper level of the vault was bright to Roane and he blinked his eyes
rapidly as he focused on Bordeleaux.
 
It
was the man who had pursued him across deserts and mountains, into England,
still always in pursuit as if Roane was the most dangerous and vile criminal
ever known.
 
He was still tall, slender,
and resembling Christ in dress and appearance.
 
Tertious Bordeleaux was a horrific excuse for
a priest, more demon than angel.

For a brief, electrified moment, they simply stared at one
another.
 
Roane seriously considered
lunging at the man and throttling him, but he fought off his natural instincts.
To make a move would be to completely negate his chance for escape. They would
probably kill him on the spot.
 
Therefore, he simmered.

“It has,” Roane said after a lengthy pause. “As it will come for
you as well, sooner than you think. Tell me, Bordeleaux; when you stand before
God in judgment, what will be your excuse to him why you threw the label
‘heresy’ on any man who did not allow you to do as you pleased, or any man
whose piety and devotion to the Order was greater than your own?
 
Do you think God will forgive you of your
most deadly sins of envy and greed?”

Bordeleaux’s smug expression faded. “I do not have to answer to
you, de Garr,” he said. “Worry about yourself for you will meet God much sooner
than I.”

“Mayhap,” Roane replied, almost casually. “If I do, I will make
sure to tell him everything I know about you so that when you finally meet, you
will have much explaining to do.”

Bordeleaux had lost his humor completely. He reached out and
grabbed Roane by the arm, his fingers digging into his cold and dirty flesh.

“You are an instrument of the Devil,” he snarled. “I will take
great pleasure in your death today. Long have I waited for this
moment.
”

Roane didn’t reply.
 
He met
Bordeleaux’s seething gaze with his usual steady resolve.
 
Roane knew what the man was about, his
corruption and wickedness, and Bordeleaux was aware of de Garr’s knowledge. He
was a threat indeed, in more ways than one, but mostly, he seemed to be a
threat to Bordeleaux himself.
 

“Get him out of my sight,” he growled. “Take him to the scaffold
where we will purge his dark innards and lay him open for all to see.
 
Today is a day of deliverance for the holy
and righteous of England.
 
Today we do
away with Satan’s right hand!”

He was being dramatic, as he usually was.
 
The man had a big mouth and a loud voice.
Albert shoved Roane away from Bordeleaux, grabbing his arm as he yanked him up the
narrow flight of steps and into the daylight beyond.
 
It was raining outside, a fine mist coating
the land, as Albert dragged Roane to a wagon that was strewn with damp and
musty hay.
 
As he forced Roane to his
knees, two soldiers came up with a heavy piece of wood between them, about six
feet in length, and they lay the wood across Roane’s broad shoulders.

Albert took the lead in strapping Roane’s arms to the pole, making
sure the ropes looked tight but in reality, they were quite loose.
 
He wouldn’t let anyone else tie Roane down,
instead, keeping up a steady stream of curses as he strapped the man to the
pole, spewing hatred and blaming Roane for the general failings of
mankind.
 
Bordeleaux had followed them up
to the bailey to watch the prisoner loaded and was pleased by Albert’s attitude
and general roughness towards Roane.
  

But it was all an act; by the time they loaded Roane into the
wagon, Roane had to hold on to the pole because the bindings were loose enough
that the pole might slip from them if jostled too much.
 
That would end the charade far too quickly if
that was to happen.
 
He had to make a
show of it.

As the mist turned into rain and the wind began to pick up, Bordeleaux
and two other priests climbed into a fine carriage to precede Roane’s wagon
from the compound.
 
The gates of Clavell
Hill were open and the portcullis was up as Bordeleaux’s carriage headed out,
making the sharp left turn that would take them directly to the square and the
scaffold.
  
Roane in his wagon,
surrounded by eight soldiers, with two knights in the lead and Albert bringing
up the rear, lurched from the gatehouse and followed Bordeleaux’s carriage into
town.

It was dawn and people had turned out to see the heretic brought
to justice.
 
The weather seemed to be
keeping the crowd size down as the wet and weary stood along the muddy avenue,
watching the procession pass by. Roane kept his head down, trying to appear as
if he was penitent and frightened, when in fact he was trying to locate Alisanne
among the sopping peasants from the corner of his eye.
 
It was cold, with rain dripping off his pink nose,
when they passed by a group and he swore he saw his brother’s face beneath a
dark hood.
 
But he couldn’t gain a clear
look and they passed by before he could make a second try.

The storm was increasing and a bolt of lightning streaked across
the sky.
 
It was enough to chase more
people inside, the lure of a good execution not strong enough to keep them out
in the elements. Roane was soaking wet, feeling cold and miserable, but more
than alert and prepared for what needed to be done.
 
He couldn’t see Albert but he knew the man
was around.
 
His body was tense, waiting
for all hell to break loose. He knew it was coming, too. He had to be ready.

Something hit him on the temple and he staggered, seeing stars
dance before his eyes.
 
Looking down at
the hay around him, he could see a cold wet rock glistening in the rain.
 
He could also feel something warm trickling
down the side of his face and he knew it was blood.
 
So he tried to keep his head down, not
wanting to get knocked out by frenzied peasants before he had a chance to
escape.
 
He doubted Albert would be able
to lug his unconscious body to safety.

More lightning lit up the sky and he glanced up, noting that the
rain was falling heavier now.
 
They were
passing through a narrow part of the avenue and the buildings were close;
people were hanging out of the second floor windows to watch the solemn
procession roll by.
 
Roane shook the
water from his eyes and as he did so, he noticed the town center up ahead and
the dark shadows of the scaffold.
 
He
could feel his pulse quicken as his gaze beheld the tall, narrow lines of the
scaffold; whatever was going to happen had to occur soon because the platform
for his death was upon them.
  

He labored to remain calm, his innate sense of knightly control
feeding his manner.
 
He kept his
attention focused on his surroundings, on Albert, and on Alisanne. He knew that
she must be nearby; he couldn’t see her but he could feel her, that sweet heart
of warmth that he’d missed so terribly.
 
He had no idea what her role was in all of this but he knew that she
would be participating somehow.
  
He
couldn’t wait to see her, praying that everything worked out as it should and
very soon they would all be on their way to safety.
 
It was the only thought that kept him going
at the moment.

Hurry, Albert! Whatever you’re
going to do, do it soon!